Showing posts sorted by relevance for query PASSOVER. Sort by date Show all posts

Sunday, April 08, 2007

Gnostic Easter

I decided to be a wee bit blasphemous for Easter/Passover season. Consider it my Gnostic duty.

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Jesus, Gnostic, Gospels, Easter, Passover, God Eater, Christianity, gnostic

Sunday, April 17, 2022

The joy of seeing Ramadan, Easter and Passover in one supermarket aisle

One mainstream store had offerings reflecting the Muslim, Christian and Jewish festivals

People gather at the UK's largest open Iftar organised by the Ramadan Tent Project,

on the steps of the Royal Albert Hall, London on Wednesday. PA Wire

There are a number of ways to measure an inclusive, tolerant society: the ability for anyone to walk freely and safely in public; equality and opportunity in the workplace; and respect for all irrespective of, for example, skin colour, age and gender. But can the extent of a society’s inclusivity and tolerance be gauged simply by wandering around a supermarket? Most definitely.

Buying goods and services has always been an essential part of human existence, from the everyday items of food and clothing to personalised and specialist treats and luxuries. Our lives depend on the essentials, but how we fulfil ourselves depends on the broader range of items and the experience that is wrapped around them when we set out to shop.

If you go into a shop and the products and services you seek are absent, the implicit message is that the way that shop’s owners thinks about individuals is not shaped around you. You have no place in it. It shows that your needs, your lifestyle and the very essence of who you are have not been recognised and is, most likely, not valued. You are excluded. And this sort of exclusion can extend to society at large. After all, if shops in a particular country or even city do not have products you are looking for, there is a good chance this means that manufacturers, product managers, business leaders, marketeers and others have simply not considered your existence. In fact, not even your pound, dollar, dirham or rupee matters in such circumstances.

A shopper at a supermarket in London ahead of Easter. EPA

Growing up in the UK, the implicit and explicit messages I received from many people and institutions around me suggested that my ethnicity and heritage were inferior. I sometimes got the impression that I needed to hide them and even be ashamed of them. The concept of Ramadan was often considered shocking and unimaginable, while Eid celebrations were viewed as an aberration when compared to other mainstream holidays. My hunch is that friends and peers from other minority cultures, backgrounds and religions had similar experiences.

This sense of negativity and exclusion is, sadly, something that is deep rooted for so many.

Imagine, then, my delight when I recently walked into a local supermarket and noticed something I thought was profoundly beautiful. In one aisle were offerings for Ramadan, Easter and Passover all in a row, reflecting the Muslim, Christian and Jewish festivals. That is because this weekend, the Christian world is observing Easter. Ramadan is ongoing with Eid on the horizon. It's also Passover as well as Vaisakhi, which is celebrated by Hindus and Sikhs all over the world. In short, there is a confluence of faiths and festivities – each with its own unique meaning and accompanying rituals.

Shelina Janmohamed

Shelina Janmohamed is a columnist for The National

Friday, April 07, 2006

Judas the Obscure

No longer.

A newly released translation of the Gospel of Judas, coming of course from the Gnostic Dead Sea Scrolls, reveals that Judas was not the traitor he is smeared as in the Gospels of the syncophants; Mark and Luke.

Time line since discovery of Gospel of Judas

The text's existence has been known since it was denounced as heresy by the bishop of Lyon in A.D. 180, but its contents had remained an almost total mystery. Unlike the four gospels of the New Testament, it describes conversations between Jesus and Judas Iscariot during the week before Passover in which Jesus tells Judas "secrets no other person has ever seen."The other apostles pray to a lesser God, Jesus says, and he reveals to Judas the "mysteries of the kingdom" of the true God. He asks Judas to help him return to the kingdom, but to do so, Judas must help him abandon his mortal flesh: "You will sacrifice the man that clothes me," Jesus tells Judas, and acknowledges that Judas "will be cursed by the other generations."

Rather as the radical zealot in the liberation army of the Jews at the time, Judas was key to the Passover Plot. To radicalize the Jewish community into a mass uprising, with the symbolic death and ressurection of the Messiah myth being played out in public.

According to this book Jesus had planned everything precisely: so that he would not be on the cross for more than a few hours before the Sabbath arrived when it was required that Jews be taken down; that one of his supporters, who was on hand, would give him some water to quench his thirst that was laced with a drug to make him unconscious; and that Joseph of Arimathea, a well-connected supporter, would get him released off the cross while still alive (but appearing dead) so that he could be nursed back to health in the tomb under the safety of the Sabbath.

It is this Gnostic mythology that is celebrated in Progressive Rock Album; Jesus Christ Superstar, and the heretical movie; The Last Temptation of Christ.

If anything is guarnteed to shake up the Pauline church, both the Orthodox and Catholic, this will. For modern Christianity does not originate in the faith of the Jews or Essenes or even the Gnostics of the time, it is the State Religion of Empire, of Constantine and the Pauline heresy of de-judaizing Jesus.

Ironic eh, Judas, Judah, Jews, de-judaizing, the very origin of anti-semitism within Christianity begins with Judas betrayl, a radical Jew a Zealot, then the blaming of Philistines for denying Jesus, etc. The origin of Revisionist History begins with Saul/Paul and the Pauline church which will now face its historic cumupeance with this revelation.

Just in time for Easter, which has nothing to do with Jesus at all, any more than Christmas has.

And of course this is really going to help the sales of the Da Vinci Code.

And did you know that Jesus had a brother?

His name was James and his gospel has yet to be translated.

And of course this is still more heresy.

Op-Ed Contributor The Gospel Truth Elaine Pagels

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Judas, Jesus, Gnostic, Gospels, Easter, Passover, Plot, Essenes, Gnostics, Dead, Sea, Scrolls, Christianity, Pauline, Constantine

Friday, April 15, 2022

Who was the Exodus Pharaoh?

Some believe that the absence of the Pharaoh’s name demonstrates that the story we read over Passover is not historical in any way—that it’s just an old campfire tale from Canaan.

(April 15, 2022 / JNS) It almost seems like a joke. The author of Exodus 5:2 has Pharaoh tell Moses: “Who is this Yahweh that I should obey him and let Israel go?” But by now, more people have wondered: Who is this pharaoh? The Torah doesn’t bother to say. It’s as if the biblical author wanted future generations to scratch their heads. As if we’re meant to remember God’s name and not some transient earthly king’s.

Some believe that the absence of the Pharaoh’s name demonstrates that the story we read over Passover is not historical in any way—that it’s just an old campfire tale from Canaan. Egyptian records, the skeptics point out, don’t mention any Hebrew escape. But, then again, it would be surprising if they did. “The ancient Egyptians didn’t record defeats; they had a different conception of history than we do,” notes Egyptologist Bob Brier. Smitten foes, not successful slave revolts, made the hieroglyphic headlines.

And despite the missing name, other details in the biblical narrative suggest the author was immersed in Egyptian culture. Take Exodus 8:32, when “Pharaoh hardened his heart and would not let the people go.” That verse is likely an allusion to the Egyptian theological notion that the heart is made heavy with evil deeds. Ancient papyri and tomb walls depict afterlife scenes wherein the deceased’s heart is weighed against the feather of Ma’at (order and justice). Cleverly, the Exodus author is making use of this Egyptian mythology of sin in order to represent the Pharaoh’s twisted inner life.

Or look at the verse from Exodus 2:3, when Moses’s mother “got a papyrus basket for him and coated it with tar and pitch; and she placed the child in it and put it among the reeds along the bank of the Nile.” All the italicized words in this single verse in the Hebrew Bible are of Egyptian etymology, according to Egyptologist James Hoffmeier. He further points out that several Israelites of the Exodus generation had Egyptian names: Miriam, Merari, Phineas, Putiel. Moses, too, is Egyptian, meaning “is born,” a fitting appellation for a baby saved from a riverbank.

Some Hebrews even had names derived from Egyptian deities. Assir, for example, is from Osiris. Ahira integrates the name of the sun god Re. And Hur, Hori and Harnepher come from the sky god Horus—a deity that was one of the most revered divinities in the Nile Delta region, where Hebrew slaves were said to have built Egyptian storehouses made of mudbricks with straw. And that, incidentally, is another provocative historical detail: Bricks with straw were not made in Canaan. Those were common in the very area where the Exodus storyteller places the Hebrews.

Other archaeological evidence further attests to the presence of a Levantine slave force in ancient Egypt. The famous scene from the Tomb of Rekhmire, circa 1450 BCE, depicts Semitic and black slaves making and hauling bricks at Karnak. Then there is the Papyrus Brooklyn (17th century BCE) that, according to archaeologist Titus Kennedy, lists domestic servants with feminine Hebrew names such as Ashera (Asher), Menahema (Menahem), ‘Aqoba (Yaqob), as well as Shiphrah, Haya-wr (Chaya) and even Hy’b’rw, which may be an Egyptian rendition of “Hebrew.”

Now, if the above linguistic and archeological evidence lends some historical credence to the Exodus drama, when might it have happened? Hard to say. Scholars are bitterly divided into two or three broad camps. All of them (as far as this layman can tell) examine the same biblical and extra-biblical evidence, but each camp deduces radically different dating schemes because of their differing epistemological and mathematical presuppositions about the Bible narrative.

One prominent camp locates the Hebrew emancipation in the 15th century BCE, which would mean the Exodus Pharaoh is either Thutmose III (1479-1425) or Amenhotep II (1427-1400). Another influential camp of scholars—and the Disney Corporation—tell us it happened later in the 13th century BCE, thus making Ramses II (1279-1213) the royal villain. Both camps, interestingly, have Bible-believing religious members in their scholarly ranks. But none so far seems to have conclusively revealed the pharaoh’s name.

The Exodus author has therefore left us with an enduring historical mystery. And maybe, just maybe, that was intended—and worth thinking about over Passover.

As philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein once remarked about the historicity of scripture, “But can’t we say: It is important that this narrative should not have more than quite middling historical plausibility, just so that this should not be taken as the essential, decisive thing. So that the letter should not be believed more strongly than is proper and the spirit should receive its due. In other words, what you are supposed to see cannot be communicated even by the best, most accurate historian; therefore, a mediocre account suffices, is even to be preferred. For that too can tell you what you are supposed to be told—roughly in the way a mediocre stage set can be better than a sophisticated one, painted trees better than real ones, which distract attention from what matters.”

JONAH COHEN

Jonah Cohen is the communications director for the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis (CAMERA).

Wednesday, April 29, 2020

‘A phantom plague’: Evangelicals who defied social distancing guidelines are dying of coronavirus in frightening numbers

PASSOVER IS ABOUT PLAGUE, PESTILENCE AND THE RETURN OF THE ANGEL OF DEATH; AZAZEL

April 29, 2020 By Alex Henderson, AlterNet]

Countless non-fundamentalist churches in the United States, from Catholic to Lutheran and Episcopalian, have embraced social distancing during the coronavirus pandemic and temporarily moved their activities online. But many Christian fundamentalists and evangelicals have been irresponsibly downplaying the dangers of COVID-19 and doing so with deadly results: journalist Alex Woodward, in the U.K.-based Independent, reports that the pandemic has claimed the lives of more than 30 pastors in the Bible Belt.

“Dozens of pastors across the Bible Belt have succumbed to coronavirus after churches and televangelists played down the pandemic and actively encouraged churchgoers to flout self-distancing guidelines,” Woodward reports. “As many as 30 church leaders from the nation’s largest African-American Pentecostal denomination have now been confirmed to have died in the outbreak, as members defied public health warnings to avoid large gatherings to prevent transmitting the virus.”

Within Christianity, there are major differences between non-fundamentalist Mainline Protestant denominations such as the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church and fundamentalist Pentecostals. And Woodward, in The Independent, discusses the Pentecostals who have openly defied social distancing.
“The virus has had a wildly disproportionate impact among black congregations, many of which have relied on group worship,” Woodward explains. “Yet despite the climbing death toll, many US church leaders throughout the Bible Belt have not only continued to hold services, but have urged worshippers to continue paying tithes — including recent stimulus checks — to support their mission.”

One of the fundamentalists who defied social distancing, according to Woodward, was Bishop Gerald Glenn, founder of the New Deliverance Evangelistic Church in Chesterfield, Virginia. While other pastors were moving their sermons online, Glenn preached at a March 15 service that was attended by almost 200 people — and on April 14, CNN reported that Glenn had died of coronavirus.

Woodward points out that according to a recent poll by Religion News Service, 90% of congregations have suspended their in-person gatherings. But Woodward also notes that the survey “found that evangelicals were more likely to report worshipping in person.”

One of the far-right evangelical extremists who has encouraged worshippers to defy social distancing is Pastor Rodney Howard-Browne, a Pentecostal fundamentalist in Florida. Howard-Browne has irresponsibly described coronavirus as a “phantom plague” and was arrested for his blatant defiance of social distancing rules.

The Passover

https://www.bl.uk/learning/cult/inside/goldhaggadahstories/passover/thepassover.html

The angel of death killing first born Egyptians, Add.27210, f.14v

Enlarge

The heartless Pharaoh still refused to free the Israelite slaves. So God, brought about one last plague, which was so terrible that it was certain to persuade Pharaoh to let his slaves go.

That night, God sent the angel of death to kill the firstborn sons of the Egyptians. God told Moses to order the Israelite families to sacrifice a lamb and smear the blood on the door of their houses. In this way the angel would know to 'pass over' the houses of the Israelites. This is why the festival commemorating the escape from Egypt is known as Passover.

This image shows several scenes from Passover. On the right in a domed room, the angel of death is swinging his sword at a man in bed. On the left the Pharaoh and Queen are mourning the death of their first born son. Below is a funeral scene with six men carrying a firstborn's coffin.

Death angel” or “destroyer” or “destruction” in Exodus 12:23?“

In Exo. 12:12-13, it is written,

12 For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and I will smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast, and I will execute judgment against all the gods of Egypt. I am Yahveh. 13 And the blood shall be your sign upon the houses where you are. And when I see the blood, then I will [וּפָסַחְתִּי] over you, and the destroyer’s plague shall not be among you when I smite the land of Egypt.

יב וְעָבַרְתִּי בְאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם בַּלַּיְלָה הַזֶּה וְהִכֵּיתִי כָל בְּכוֹר בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם מֵאָדָם וְעַד בְּהֵמָה וּבְכָל אֱלֹהֵי מִצְרַיִם אֶעֱשֶׂה שְׁפָטִים אֲנִי יַהְוֶה יג וְהָיָה הַדָּם לָכֶם לְאֹת עַל הַבָּתִּים אֲשֶׁר אַתֶּם שָׁם וְרָאִיתִי אֶת הַדָּם וּפָסַחְתִּי עֲלֵכֶם וְלֹא יִהְיֶה בָכֶם נֶגֶף לְמַשְׁחִית בְּהַכֹּתִי בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם

The narrative is a bit complex; however, the general idea is as follows. The Israelites sacrifice the Pesach offering.1 The blood of this Pesach offering is caught in a basin, and a bunch of hyssop is used to apply the blood to the lintel and two side-posts of the Israelite homes.2 Yahveh via Moses tells the Israelites that the blood applied to their door-posts in the specified manner will be “your sign” [לָכֶם לְאֹת].3 Yahveh sees this sign and does not allow the destroyer [מַשְׁחִית] to come unto their houses to plague the Israelites.4 The destroyer [הַמַשְׁחִית] is an entity that is to plague [לִנְגֹּף]5 with a plague [נֶגֶף]6 every firstborn in Egypt where Yahveh does not see the sign of the blood upon the door-posts. In fact, the plague is referred to as “the destroyer’s plague” [נֶגֶף לְמַשְׁחִית].7

Since it is written that Yahveh Himself will “pass through” (note: this is the verb עָבַר) the land of Egypt and smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, but this is actually accomplished via “the destroyer” which plagues the firstborn of Egypt with a plague, we can reasonably conclude that the destroyer is Yahveh’s agent of destruction. Yonatan ben Uzziel suspects as much, as he interpreted the Hebrew into Aramaic as מלאכא מחבלא (“the destroying angel”) in his targum.8

Therefore, we have Yahveh, and Yahveh’s destroyer. These are two separate entities. The latter is Yahveh’s agent which executes judgment upon Egypt and plagues the firstborn with the plague of death. A similar entity encountered in 1 Chr. 21:15 is referred to as “the destroying9 angel” [לַמַּלְאָךְ הַמַּשְׁחִית] and executes judgment and destruction at God’s behest.

Meredith G. Kline wrote,10

With that being said, it’s a bit easier to understand what is occurring during the final plague. As the destroyer is passing through Egypt, it is plaguing the firstborns with the plague of death, thus killing them. However, the destroyer is impeded from entering the houses of the Israelites only because Yahveh Himself sees the sign of the blood on their door-posts. When Yahveh sees this sign, He does not “pass over” the Israelites’ houses. If Yahveh were to simply pass over their houses, it would not impede the destroyer who could enter the houses after Yahveh passed over. (Therefore, the verb פָּסַח does not really mean “pass over” when translated into English.) Yahveh, upon seeing the sign of the blood upon the door-posts, then covers (or protects) these houses. When Yahveh covers the houses of the Israelites, the destroyer is not allowed to come unto the houses to plague the Israelites. Yahveh Himself is providing divine protection over these houses until all the firstborns of Egypt without divine protection have been plagued and killed by the destroyer.
References

Keil, Carl Friedrich. Commentary on the Old Testament. 1900. Reprint. Trans. Martin, James. Vol. 1. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1986.

Kline, Meredith G. "The Feast of Cover-Over." Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society. 37/4 (1994): 497-510.
Footnotes

1 Exo. 12:28 cp. Exo. 12:6, 12:21

2 Exo. 12:28 cp. Exo. 12:7, 12:22

3 Exo. 12:23 cp. Exo. 12:13

4 Exo. 12:23 cp. Exo. 12:13

5 Exo. 12:23

6 Exo. 12:13

7 Exo. 12:13. Granted, Carl Friedrich Keil (p. 19) commented, "...there is no article with למשׁחית." He understands נֶגֶף לְמַשְׁחִית as meaning "plague to destroy." However, the article would be indicated by a dagesh (small dot) within the מ, like so מּ, and such [Masoretic] vowel pointing would not have been part of the original manuscript.

8 Targum of Yonatan ben Uzziel, Exo. 12:23

9 or "destroyer"

10 p. 499
https://hermeneutics.stackexchange.com/questions/22444/death-angel-or-destroyer-or-destruction-in-exodus-1223

JEWISH VIRTUAL LIBRARY DEMONS AND DEMONOLOGY

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/demons-and-demonology

MAVET (Mawet), the ordinary Hebrew word for death, is also the proper name of a Canaanite underworld god (Mot), the enemy of Baal in a Ugaritic epic. The proper name, not the common noun, should probably be understood in Isaiah 28:15, 18: "We have made a covenant with Death," and Jeremiah 9:20 [Eng. 9:21]: "For Death is come up into our windows" (cf. Hos. 13:14; Job 18:13, "the firstborn of Death"; 28:22).

RESHEPH is another major god of the Canaanite religion who becomes a demonic figure in biblical literature. Resheph is known as the god of plague over much of the ancient Near East, in texts and artistic representations spanning more than a millennium from 1850 B.C.E. to 350 B.C.E. In Habakkuk 3:5, YHWH on the warpath is said to be preceded and followed by respectively Dever and Resheph. (This is similar to the picture of two divine attendants who escort major gods in ancient myths.) Just as some other names of deities are used as common nouns in biblical Hebrew (Dagon (dagon, "grain"); Ashtaroth (ashtarot, "increase [of the flock]"), etc.) so Reshef (reshef) has come to mean simply "plague" (Deut. 33:29; Ps. 78:48), and the fiery darts of the bow (Ps. 76:4 [Eng. 76:3]; Song 8:6), apparently from the common association of plagueand arrows.

DEVER ("Pestilence") is the other demonic herald who marches with YHWH to battle (Hab. 3:5). Dever is also mentioned in Psalms 91:5–6: "Thou shalt not be afraid for the Terror (Paḥad) by night; Nor for the Arrow (Ḥeẓ) that flieth by day; Nor for the Pestilence (Dever) that walketh in the darkness; Nor for the Destruction (Ketev) that wasteth at noonday." Not only Dever but also the other words italicized above have been plausibly identified as names of demons. The "Arrow" is a familiar symbol in folklore, for disease or sudden pain, and Ketev (Qetev; cf. Deut. 32:24; Isa. 28:2; Hos. 13:14) is in this instance the personification of overpowering noonday heat, known also to Greek and Roman demonology.

AZAZEL (ʿAzʾazel) occurs in the ritual for the Day of Atonement (Lev. 16:8, 10, 26). Aaron casts lots over two goats, and the one "for ʿAzʾazel" is presented alive before the Lord, and then released into the wilderness. The ancient Greek and Latin versions understood ʿAzʾazel as "goat that departs," hence "the scapegoat" of some English versions. Most of the rabbinic commentators and some moderns take Azazel as the name of the place to which the goat is driven. The great majority of moderns regard Azazel as the personal name of a demon thought to live in the wilderness.

Aaron Seized the Angel of Death

Rabbi Moshe Ben-Chaim

http://www.mesora.org/korach-aaron-angel.html

As the Jews were now second guessing their accusation, but not completely abandoning this false view of Aaron and Moses, the plague stopped, but only temporarily, reflecting their temporal suspension of their accusation. We may interpret Aaron as “seizing the angel of death” as his correction the Jews’ error that Moses and Aaron were murderers. “Seizing the Angel of Death” means Aaron removed the cause of death in the remaining Jews; he corrected their false notions.

When they saw Aaron standing between the living and the dead with incense halting the plague, the Jews were confused. Aaron is Moses’ messenger, but the plague was clearly from God. So, how could Aaron and Moses overpower God? This is what Rashi means when metaphorically the Angel of Death tells Aaron, “I am the messenger of God, and you are (only) the messenger of Moses.” The Angel in this metaphor personifies the false opinions of the people, which caused death. But with a corrected opinion, God will not kill. So, the Angel talking in this metaphor represents the Jewish people’s corrupt opinion, which in fact causes death. (Sometimes, false views can be so wrong that the follower of such a view deserves death.)

Returning to the Rashi, Aaron replies to the Angel one last time, “Moses says nothing on his own accord, rather, (he says matters only) through God. If you do not believe me, behold Moses and God are at the Tent of Meeting, come with me and ask.” At this point, the plague was temporarily stopped, as the Jews were entertaining the idea that Moses and Aaron were not murderers, as Aaron was trying to keep them alive. Their perplexity about whether Aaron and Moses were following God had to be removed if they were to live permanently. This is what is meant that when Aaron returned to the tent of meeting (Num. 17:15) and the plague was terminated completely. As the Jews witnessed Aaron, Moses, and God “together” they now understood that Moses and Aaron were in fact followers of God. The metaphor depicts Aaron as “seizing” the corrupt views of the people which demanded their death, allegorized by seizing the “Angel of Death.”

This Rashi is yet another of literally thousands of examples where the Rabbis wrote in riddles, as King Solomon taught in Proverbs 1:6. We learn from King Solomon, to whom God gave knowledge miraculously (Kings I, 3:12) that riddles are a means of education. We must continue to look for the hidden meanings in the Rabbis’ words, which at first seem bizarre. We must not take amazing stories literally. There are no demons roaming the Earth, no angels of death, no powers of segulas that protect. God is the only power, and He created the Earth and heavens and all they behold, with distinct, limited physical properties and laws. Physical creation cannot exceed its design: a string dyed red does not suddenly get transformed into a device which wards off God’s punishments. It is unfortunate that we have become so idolatrous with red bendels.

What is worse, is that children are taught to accept superstitions. They become prime candidates for missionaries. Superstitious rearing teaches children that Christianity is no different.

This new mystical, pop-kabbalistic Judaism blurs the lines between true Torah principles and all other religions. When Jews fail to see the difference between a superstitious Judaism and other religions, they more easily convert. And they are accurate in this equation: there is no difference between a Judaism that preaches segulas, or that parts of God are “inside man,” and between Christianity that makes identical claims.

THE DESTROYING ANGEL

JEWISH BIBLE STUDIES
Vol. 42, No. 4, 2014

https://jbqnew.jewishbible.org/assets/Uploads/424/jbq_424_bardestroyingangel.pdf

THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT
The destroying angel seems to be alluded to in the Bible's description of the
slaying of the firstborn, where he is called ha-mashhit: for the Lord will pass
over the door and not let the Destroyer enter and smite your home
(Ex. 12:23). While is stated explicitly that the Lord passed through Egypt to
smite the firstborn (Ex. 12:12–13), and the text of the Passover Haggadah
expounds this to mean, "I and not an angel," verse 23 attests that the Lord
was accompanied by the destroying angel, whose nature is to strike down all
whom he encounters, unless – as here – the Lord restrains him. This seems to
be the intention of the Mekhilta's comment on verse 22, None of you shall go
outside the door of his house until morning: "This indicates that when the
destroying angel is given permission to do harm, he does not distinguish between the righteous and the wicked."
The Psalmist's account of the plagues of Egypt (Ps. 78:49) indicates that the plagues were inflicted by mishlahat malakhei ra'im – a band of deadly [lit. evil] angels. The talmudic sages used the term mishlahat to describe a band of destructive creatures, specifically a wolf pack.
Kraus believes that this "band of evil angels" does not refer to the
l"destroying angel" (mashhit) associated with the last plague (Ex. 12:23), but
to the demonic powers that the Lord dispatches with every affliction.
It seems, then, that we must distinguish the "destroying angel," ha-mashhit,
from the messengers of death who come to punish individuals only. By contrast, the Destroyer is sent by the Lord to kill multitudes through a plague.
Unlike the deadly messengers, who bring both natural and premature death,
the Destroyer inflicts only a premature, painful death. Still, this mashhit is

controlled by God.

PDF

A Dictionary of Angels, including the fallen angels - Masada ...

https://masada.world › assets › angels

Angels bewailing the death of Jesus, a detail from a fresco by Giotto in the Arena Chapel, Padua. ... In Leviticus, he is Azazel, the "goat of the sin offering. ... plagues, fed hermits, helped plowmen, converted heathens. An angel ... damned, opened the door to a return of Satan to his archangelic perch in the Heavenly purlieus.

Monday, May 06, 2024

US elite figures threaten pro-Palestine protesters with repercussions

American business leaders and legal experts have publicly voiced their disapproval of the pro-Palestine protesters and have threatened them with their job finding process.

Student demonstrations met with strong American police crackdown while thousands of students detained. / Photo: AA

Influential American figures from various sectors have taken a firm stance against the protesters threatening them with their future as demonstrations in support of Palestinians have spread across the United States and beyond.

ExxonMobil CEO Darren Woods said the oil company would not be interested in hiring students taking part in pro-Palestinian protests at college campuses across the US.

"Harassment and intimidation, there's no place for that, frankly, at those universities and certainly no place for that in a company like ExxonMobil," Woods said in an interview with CNBC this week.

"We wouldn't look to bring folks like that into our company and if that action or those protests reflect the values of the campuses where they're doing it, we wouldn't be interested in recruiting students from those campuses," he added.

Student demonstrations began on April 17 at Columbia University to protest Israel's offensive in Gaza, where more than 34,600 Palestinians have been killed and 77,700 injured since an October 7 attack by Hamas.

The protests have served as a flashpoint for the wider movement to protest Israel’s war on Gaza.

'Will bring your picture in background check'

Shark Tank host and businessman Kevin O'Leary had a much more blunt take on the consequences student demonstrators may face after graduating.

"These people are screwed," O'Leary said during a Fox News interview earlier this week, describing how artificial intelligence (AI) can identify each and every protester from video footage being taken at campus demonstrations.

"Everything being shot now is 1080p or 4K, even the surveillance cameras. Every single image, even at night now, goes into an AI generator and will tell you who that individual is," he explained.

"I have a lot of companies. I hire thousands of people. Within weeks, I'm gonna be able on, when we're doing your background check, I'm going to find this cause it's going to be in there on the dark web," O'Leary continued, gesturing to two hypothetical stacks of resumes. "Here's your resume with a picture of you burning a flag. See that one? That goes in this pile over here cause I can get the same person's talent in this pile that's not burning anything," he said.

"I don't care what university or what you're burning or whose side you're on. You'll never know why you didn't get a mortgage ... you'll never know I didn't get the job because we see you now, and all you need is to have your eyes exposed with a new 4K image, and for the rest of your life, you're in this pile."

'We'll bankrupt them'

Meanwhile, Alan Dershowitz, a lawyer known with his pro-Israeli views, vowed that he would take every legal step necessary to punish student protesters engaging in any allegedly antisemitic actions, referring to them as "bigots, antisemites and potentially violent terrorists."

"We will sue them and we will get their dorm rooms taken away. We will take their cars and their boomboxes and we'll bankrupt them," Dershowitz said in an interview with Newsmax.

"We will do whatever is necessary, under the law, in order to bring these lawsuits, bring them successfully and deter Oct. 7," he said, referring to a cross-border attack last year by Palestinian groups from Gaza into Israel.

Israel has pounded Gaza since a cross-border attack by Hamas, which Tel Aviv says killed nearly 1,200 people.

The Israeli war on Gaza has pushed 85 percent of the territory's population into internal displacement amid acute shortages of food, clean water, and medicine, while 60 percent of the enclave's infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.

Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice. An interim ruling in January ordered Tel Aviv to stop genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.

Hostilities have continued unabated, however, and aid deliveries remain woefully insufficient to address the humanitarian catastrophe.

SOURCE: AA

Tensions flare between DePaul pro-Palestine encampment and counterprotesters

By AVANI KALRA | akalra@chicagotribune.com | Chicago Tribune
PUBLISHED: May 5, 2024

A group organized by the Chicago Jewish Alliance gathered at Fullerton and Seminary avenues Sunday morning in response to an encampment set up Tuesday at DePaul University to protest the war in Gaza.

Members of Chabad Lincoln Park, Stand With Us, Hillel Metro Chicago and the Jewish Institute for Liberal Voices, among other groups, helped organize the demonstration and said they wanted to help Jewish DePaul students feel safer. The group flew Israeli and American flags.

Doreen Helmer traveled from Northbrook to attend Sunday’s counter-rally. She said it was important to her to travel to Lincoln Park to defend Israel in what she considers to be an increasingly hostile environment.

“It’s sad to see what’s happening in our city,” Helmer said. “They’re allowing these protests to ruin our campus and our neighborhoods. My friends can’t enjoy their neighborhood, they can’t walk their children to school anymore because of this. This is not free speech.”

Helmer said she was driving to the encampment Sunday afternoon flying an Israeli flag from her car when someone jumped on the car and tried to rip the flag off.

Henna Ayesh, an organizer and a media liaison with the DePaul encampment, said she was proud of the way encampment protesters have handled counterprotesters on campus. Leaders have been hosting a “de-escalation training” two to three times a day, she said, to teach them how to interact with counterprotesters.

Members of the encampment locked arms around the quad Sunday morning, facing the counterprotesters and surrounding their tents, while Chicago police formed two lines separating the groups.

Ayesh, who is a Palestinian student, said she is proud of the self-sustaining community she’s seen arise in the encampment. Organizers instructed encampment protesters not to engage with counterprotesters, and they have by and large respected that request, she said.

“I think one of the strongest principles of our community is that we keep each other safe,” Ayesh said. “We’re not relying on police, relying on public safety or on administration to keep us safe. We had counterprotesters throwing rocks and sticks, saying Islamophobic statements, but I’m really proud because we kept ourselves in control.”

Ayesh said there was one instance of confrontation in the encampment Sunday morning when a Palestinian student was hit in the face with a flag by a counterprotester. The student received medical attention, Ayesh said, and is doing well. According to the university, two people received treatment for minor injuries, and no arrests were made.

Pro-Israel activists argue with pro-Palestinian activists while members of the Chicago Police Department stand between the two groups outside a pro-Palestinian encampment at DePaul University in Chicago on May 5, 2024. (Armando L. Sanchez/Chicago Tribune)

About 50 pro-Palestine protesters arrested from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago
University of Chicago prepares to ‘intervene’ to remove pro-Palestine encampment from campus
As pro-Palestinian protests at some U.S. colleges devolve into violence, Chicago campuses remain peaceful

By Sunday afternoon, a smaller group of counterprotesters stood across from DePaul’s quad on Fullerton Avenue. Another group gathered on the music lawn at Halsted Street and Fullerton Avenue, with snacks, posters and flags. Cars honked as they drove by, while children holding Israeli flags stood at the entrance to the lawn.

Police moved the encampment protesters inside the quad by Sunday afternoon. Some continued to gather by the entrances and cling to fences, facing the counterprotesters.

Participants also gathered around a large stage in the middle of the encampment, chanting “Disclose, divest, we will not stop, we will not rest” and “Free, free Palestine,” drumming and waving Palestinian flags.

Ayesh said encampment organizers negotiated with DePaul administrators before erecting the encampment and were told the university is invested in companies affiliated with Israel. Ayesh said the group decided to put up tents when administrators said they did not have the power to terminate those investments.Pro-Palestinian activists argue with pro-Israel activists while members of the Chicago Police department stand between the two groups outside a pro-Palestinian encampment at DePaul University in Chicago on May 5, 2024. (Armando L. Sanchez/Chicago Tribune)

Organizers last spoke with administrators Wednesday, according to Ayesh.

“I think a lot of our demands, like calling for a cease-fire, could’ve been fulfilled the exact same day,” Ayesh said. “But it’s day five, and we haven’t heard anything.”

In a Sunday evening statement, President Robert Manuel said he, Provost Salma Ghanem and Executive Vice President and CFO Sherri Sidler had requested to meet with students from the DePaul Divestment Coalition on Monday.

“We are deeply concerned that today’s events escalated beyond peaceful protest on the Lincoln Park Campus,” Manuel said. “It is our sincerest hope that our dialogue will result in solutions for the university that will allow us to move forward.”

DePaul University sent an alert advising students to avoid the quad and encouraged them to use alternate routes on campus Sunday, according to several students gathered at the camp.

On campus, the atmosphere remained serene. Students played soccer and read outside residence halls and school buildings.

Also on Sunday, encampment organizers from the School of the Art Insititute of Chicago announced that all 68 people arrested at a demonstration Saturday were released Sunday morning

A person with a “We the people” tattoo shakes hands with officers while pro-Israel activists argue with pro-Palestinian activists as members of the Chicago Police Department stand between the two groups outside a pro-Palestinian encampment at DePaul University in Chicago on May 5, 2024. (Armando L. Sanchez/Chicago Tribune)

The encampments are among dozens across Chicago and the nation at colleges, including the University of Chicago, Columbia University and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

They started in the past few weeks amid the mounting death toll in Gaza. More than 34,000 Palestinians have been killed, according to the Hamas-run Health Ministry.

Israel launched its war in Gaza after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel, where the group killed some 1,200 people and took 250 hostages. President Joe Biden on Thursday defended the right to protest but insisted that “order must prevail” at college campuses, as some in Chicago’s Jewish community demanded action at local universities to prevent hate speech.

Chicago Tribune’s Adriana Pérez contributed.

Pro-Palestinian activists argue with pro-Israel activists while members of the Chicago Police Department stand between the two groups outside a pro-Palestinian encampment at DePaul University on May 5, 2024, in Chicago. (Armando L. Sanchez/Chicago Tribune)

Jordan's Queen Rania opens up about anti-Israel protests on US campuses, admits alarming global rise of antisemitism

The wife of King Abdullah II of Jordan, Queen Rania al Abdullah, is a Palestinian and has been an outspoken opponent of the Israel-Hamas war.

Queen Rania al-Abdullah of Jordan recently defended the wave of anti-Israel demonstrations that have taken over US campuses, claiming that the students' true goals are justice and peace.

Queen Rania advocates for justice and peace amid anti-Israel protests on US campuses

(AFP Photo)

ByNikhita Mehta
May 05, 2024

“To vilify them as being, you know, pro-Hamas, pro-terrorism, or antisemitic—II think that’s inaccurate, And I think it’s somewhat patronizing,” Rania told CBS’ “Face the Nation” in an interview that aired on Sunday.

Callng the protestors “well-read and thoughtful young individuals”, she said that they know why are they protesting. “They are protesting for justice.”

However, Rania has advocated that it is unfair to paint all these students and these protests with a broad paintbrush.

She argued that a sizable portion of the student body participating in these protests is Jewish. Furthermore, the great majority of these protestors desire peace over destruction.

The wife of King Abdullah II of Jordan, Queen Rania al Abdullah, is Palestinian and has been an outspoken opponent of the Israel's war on Hamas that was launched in October 2023 after the terrorist organisation killed 1,200 people in an unexpected attack.

Queen Rania's views on antisemitism

She did, however, concede that antisemitism is on the rise and called on Muslims everywhere to take leadership roles in the battle against it.

Rania speaks about the presence of antisemitism and how it has been on the rise. “And it is the worst kind of bigotry; it is pure hatred,” she said.

“Muslims have to be at the forefront of fighting antisemitism, because Islamophobia is the other side of the same disease, and it’s also on the rise.”

She stated that criticising the conflict "is not antisemitism," but rather "speaking against Israeli policy," and that many in the Muslim world are witnessing unsettling sights coming out of Gaza.

If Palestinians dislike Israelis, it's not because of their nationality or religion or; it's because they have only met with them as military enforcers, she explained.

Police arrest dozens of anti-Israel protesters at Chicago Art Institute

Protests escalate at Chicago's Art Institute, leading to arrests. Elsewhere, University of Michigan sees peaceful pro-Palestinian demonstration during commencement.

By THE MEDIA LINE STAFF

themedialine.org

MAY 6, 2024

Police arrest a pro-Palestinian protester at USC campus in Los Angeles, California, U.S., April 24, 2024, in this still image taken from video

(photo credit: REUTERS TV

Dozens of protesters were arrested outside the Art Institute of Chicago during a demonstration on Saturday, following a police request from the institute to clear the premises, according to the Chicago Police Department’s post on X (formerly Twitter.)

Meanwhile, protests on other campuses did not escalate to arrests. In Ann Arbor, pro-Palestinian demonstrators temporarily interrupted a University of Michigan commencement ceremony. Videos on social media showed several students donning keffiyeh headscarves and graduation caps while waving Palestinian flags.

They marched down the Michigan Stadium’s central aisle, evoking cheers and boos from the crowd. Campus police escorted the protesters toward the stadium’s back but made no arrests, according to Colleen Mastony, a university spokesperson.

Former hostages demand answers from Gantz, Eisenkot regarding hostage deal

Campus peace protests

Signs are displayed in front of Deering Meadow, where an encampment of students are protesting in support of Palestinians, during the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, at Northwestern University campus in Evanston, Illinois, US. April 25, 2024

(credit: REUTERS/Nate Swanson)

“Peaceful protests like this have taken place at U-M commencement ceremonies for decades,” Mastony said in a statement, reaffirming the university’s commitment to free speech and expression.

Controversial reactions to Israel’s conflict in Gaza have fueled heated protests across US campuses recently, with institutions like Columbia University seeking police assistance to manage the demonstrations. Police have so far detained over 2,000 protesters nationwide.

Demonstrators are protesting Israel’s response to the October 7 attack on southern Israel, in which Hamas operatives killed around 1,200 Israelis and foreign nationals and took more than 250 people hostage.

At U. of C. encampment, Jewish organizers explain significance of their anti-Zionist Shabbat service

Ahmed Ali Akbar
Chicago Tribune (TNS)

After a tense day of protests, counterprotests and increased university police presence on the University of Chicago’s Main Quadrangle, the sun began to fade Friday evening and the Jewish holy day of Sabbath began.

Within the encampment established by the University of Chicago United for Palestine coalition, about 50 Jewish students and faculty and community members sat down on a blue tarp among tents and kaffiyehs to observe a planned prayer service. One challah was decorated with a Palestinian flag in seeds and herbs; the ceremonial “wine” (grape juice) was chosen because it was not made in Israel. Palestinian flags and handmade posters with slogans protesting genocide hung from trees. As they prayed, other students, many of whom were Muslim, held up kaffiyehs, jean shirts and checkered blankets to form a privacy screen.

Since April 29, Jewish anti-Zionist protesters at the Hyde Park campus have used food, ritual and community in the encampment as one of many ways to express their religious commitment to divestment from Israel, a multiethnic future and an end to killings in Gaza. In a practical sense, that means Seders and Shabbats (or Sabbaths), with non-Israeli kosher products, teaching about the pluralistic elements of Jewish traditions like the Moroccan Jewish Mimouna, and eating Palestinian food with Muslims and others in their coalition.

Avi Steinberg, a writer, faculty member and graduate of Orthodox yeshivas who spoke at the event, described Shabbat as a time of reflection.

“People sit with their thoughts and their emotions,” Steinberg said on a phone call Saturday. “It’s a time of stopping the clock completely.”

After the prayer and singing concluded, the Shabbat observers — a small but sizable portion of the broader encampment — dispersed; at the central food tent, a half-dozen or more unflipped maqluba pots sat beside rice and meat already doled out onto steam plates. Cold chopped salads and hot lentil soup were also served. This meal, donated by Arab restaurant Al Bahaar, acted informally as the Shabbat meal. The encampment food tent staff relies on donations of hot food and attempts to keep a variety of vegan, kosher, halal and nonallergenic options available for encampment dwellers.

The Muslim maghrib prayer began soon after on the same blue tarp. The University of Chicago United for Palestine coalition includes Students for Justice in Palestine, UChicago Jews for a Free Palestine, and several other organizations.

Nationally, encampments like this one have been accused of antisemitism. But in interviews with a half-dozen or more Jewish students and affiliated faculty members within the pro-Palestine encampment at the U. of C., none of them said they felt anything resembling antisemitism within the camp. Instead, they said they felt more connected to the Jewish tradition through their activism during the protests. They argued that anti-Zionism and advocating for Palestinian freedom is in a long tradition of Jewish values of pluralism and agitation for justice.

“When we’re praying for peace and human emancipation, to me this is the essence of what it means to be Jewish,” said graduate student Daniel Fernandez, speaking outside the encampment. “What is so profoundly disappointing is that this is somehow controversial.” Fernandez has stayed at the encampment, attending or sometimes leading several of the religious services this past week.

Chicago Jewish leaders held a news conference Wednesday where they called the encampments “platforms for antisemitism.” The university’s major Jewish organizations have disavowed, criticized or ignored the protesters.

In an email to the Tribune, Rabbi Yossi Brackman of Rohr Chabad at the University of Chicago wrote, “Movements have always had a token minority, this is no different. For example, there were some Black slave owners and Black people who fought for the Confederacy.”

Talking to the Tribune from within the encampment, graduate student Sofia Butnaru said many of the Israel-critical Jewish students did not feel they had a “religious home” at the U. of C. “We felt we weren’t represented in the other spaces, so we were really interested in building our own rituals and coming together as like-minded people to do the religious practices that are very near and dear to us,” Butnaru said.

Callie Maidhof, a professor of global studies and a member of Faculty for Justice in Palestine, agreed. “(Our Jewish institutions) have not made space for this,” she said. “That is especially true of the largest Jewish campus organizations like Hillel.”

While Hillel International’s Israel guidelines say the organization welcomes political pluralism and a diversity of student perspectives, its standards also state that it will not “partner with, house, or host organizations, groups, or speakers” that support practice certain positions, like the Boycott, Divest, Sanctions movement against the state of Israel. Members of organizations like FJP and Jewish Voices for Peace, which support BDS, would not be allowed to speak at Hillel under this policy.

A Hillel rabbi acknowledged but did not respond to a request for comment from the Tribune.

Despite feeling isolated from campus Jewish groups, UChicago Jews for a Free Palestine have organized several religious events since the encampment went up. According to messages with a Jewish organizer at DePaul’s encampment, a similar Shabbat service was held within the encampment on their campus. These events have attracted supportive community members like retired researcher Sandy Perpignani. She sat outside the U. of C. encampment and engaged with critical onlookers. At Shabbat time, she entered the encampment to pray with the students and organizers.

Regardless of some personal challenges, organizers constantly recentered the conversation toward what they see as the oppression and bravery of the Palestinian people. The protesters asked the university to divest from Israel and call for a cease-fire.

Within the Divinity School, Aviva Waldman, a writing instructor and alum who acts as a faculty liaison for organizing students, described a Passover event held by encampment organizers and allies that reflected their commitment to divestment from Israel, commitment to Palestinians and embrace of interreligious pluralism.

During Passover, which ended last week, Jewish communities avoided chametz (leavened goods like wheat and spelt) and instead consumed matzo. Encampment organizers are, for the most part, supportive of the demands of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement, but many matzo brands, including Manischewitz, make much of their product in Israel. Though Manischewitz is not officially part of the BDS boycott list, organizers felt they needed to make a modification. Unable to find non-Israeli-origin matzo in Chicago, Waldman said they ordered matzo from a specialty farm in New York. Earlier, Butnaru cooked matzo ball soup for Passover using a matzo meal that was not a product of Israel.

“Our home is wherever we are,” Waldman said. “There’s no nation-state that is our national homeland. We wanted our ritual items, the matzo, to come from our home.”

Palestinian olive oil from Jenin in the Israeli-occupied West Bank was also added to the Seder plate. The oil was available a bit closer to campus, from Canaan Palestine, a Madison, Wisconsin-based company that sources organic and fair trade olive oil from Palestinian orchards.

“The Seder plate is the most symbolic ritual item,” Waldman said. “(It) symbolizes Palestinian connection to the land and commitment to nurturing the land through farming olives and olive orchards.”

Organizers also revised their Haggadah, the text traditionally read at Passover Seder, to highlight parallels between the Palestinian freedom struggle and the story of the Jewish community fleeing from Egypt.

These changes reflect deep rifts and debates happening within Chicago Jewish communities.

“The Passover Seder is about one thing and one thing only,” Yossi wrote in an email. “The exodus of the Israelites from Egyptian slavery to return to the land of their Patriarchs, what would then become known as the Land of Israel. Anything else is a bastardization of Judaism. “

Another Chicago-area rabbi was supportive of the protesters.

“I’m in favor of Jewish people observing Shabbat, praying three times daily and fulfilling the commandments wherever they are,” Rabbi Aryeh Bernstein wrote in a message on X, formerly Twitter. Bernstein said the students and organizers’ actions are “not in conflict with (the Torah and Jewish law and teachings).”

On April 30, organizers held a Mimouna, a Sephardic tradition where Moroccan Jews celebrated the end of Passover by partaking in leavened goods and sweets with their Muslim neighbors. According to the organizers, observant Jews “sell” their leavened goods to Moroccan Muslims, only to buy it back when Passover is finished. While the festival is celebrated in Israel, Waldman says the important element of coexistence is not present.

Undergraduate student Andrew Basta helped organize the Mimouna; he has stayed most nights at the encampment tents since they were established.

“The traditional kind of food of the holiday would be mofletta, which is a kind of crepe-like pancake that is sweet,” Basta said on a phone call Saturday. “Sadly, we are not able to achieve making that within the encampment, based on (lack of) access to stoves.” Instead, they settled on pita and sweet dates.

“There were moments where we could be neighbors and be friendly and celebrate together,” Butnaru said. “Not to say that it was perfect coexistence, but there was coexistence.”

Basta is optimistic about the future and sees the Mimouna as symbolic of what is possible.

“We can rebuild joyous futures and multiethnic futures where Jews and Muslims can be neighbors without being part of an apartheid state or ethnic cleansing,” Basta said.

While Passover had ended by the time of Friday’s Shabbat, many organizers were still thinking about the lessons of that story: the struggle for liberation in the face of oppression.

“There’s nothing Jewish about an ethno-state,” Butnaru said. “There’s plenty of things that are Jewish about building community.”

Many students expressed the challenges of bringing their activism to their parents. Fernandez described his parents as “deeply committed to Zionism” and said that their conversations around the subject of the war in Gaza and his organizing have been “agonizing” for both parties.

“They think when I am in these camps, standing on this tarp praying … they think I’m praying for the destruction of the Jewish people.” But Fernandez said he is committed to nonviolence. He and other organizers believe that there can be coexistence and repair between Palestinians and Jews.

For the most part, the organizers in the encampment wish things were different with their families; but that won’t stop them from protesting.

“I want to begin from a premise that their hurt is real,” Fernandez said. “Our history as Jewish people is rooted in that; it’s real and palpable and omnipresent. I don’t want to dismiss their fear … but the same Torah has placed us on opposite ends of the issue.”

During the Shabbat, Avi Steinberg spoke and referenced a daily prayer from the Book of Numbers that translated to “How goodly are your tents, oh Jacob?”

This reference got a chuckle, but he explained the deeper meaning: You need to live every day as if you are in the tents.

In a later message, Steinberg explained “that talk was presenting tent life as a metaphor for radical politics specifically … the need for maintaining that radical edge even on a daily basis when we’re not literally in the tents.” He said he believed the encampment itself is a victory and that they would succeed in getting university leadership to divest financially from Israel and call for a ceasefire.

In the meantime, they were building their vision here, in the impermanence of the tents. In what they say is a multiethnic, pluralistic group committed to justice and peace.

©2024 Chicago Tribune. Visit at chicagotribune.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

America continues its moral decline in supporting Zionist entity & suppressing all who criticize it

[05/May/2024]

SANA'A May 05. 2024 (Saba) - The United States of America continues its moral decline, its arrogance, its support , its blatant bias toward the Zionist enemy entity, and its suppression of anyone who dares to criticize this usurping entity, demonstrate against it, or reject the genocidal war it is committing in Gaza.

In this context, media reports reported that America, more than 200 days after the ongoing barbaric aggression against Gaza, continues its arrogance and blatant bias towards the Zionist enemy entity, in a shocking loss and decline of its “moral compass” not only on the external level, but also beyond. The American house front is to suppress anyone who dares to criticize the occupying entity, demonstrate against it, or reject the genocidal war in Gaza.

It stated that this decline has reached the point of dragging university professors, suppressing students, demonizing them, throwing them in prisons, or trampling on them, spraying them with dirty water, and using all the methods used by tyrannical police states in a scene that will leave a profound impact in continuing the collapse of America’s image and the fall of the alleged “Statue of Liberty” in a democracy that has revealed itself. Its true, ugly face that the whole world suffered from.

It pointed out that this decline did not stop at this point, but rather went beyond that, as America threatened and intimidated the International Criminal Court after its talk about the possibility of issuing arrest warrants against the leaders of the Zionist enemy entity because of their crimes against humanity in Gaza, led by Netanyahu and the leaders of his war council. Which sparked the madness and obsession of the Zionist enemy and the Biden administration alike.

Writer and political analyst Yasser Al-Zaatara commented on America’s reactions to the ICC, saying: “The Americans’ hysteria against the ICC began to please Netanyahu! While the Biden administration did not show a strong reaction to the court’s intention to issue an arrest warrant against Netanyahu, Gallant, and Halevy, it A frantic congressional campaign against her began.

Al-Zaatarah pointed out that Netanyahu urged Biden to "intervene" during their call, while the latter's lack of action was explained by an attempt to pressure Netanyahu to pass the possible truce , exchange deal, with it and before it, the implementation of the conditions of the possible path of normalization with Saudi Arabia.

Palestinian writer Abdel Bari Atwan exposed the secrets of the escalation and the upcoming American militancy and what is planned to be implemented in order to save the deep American state, saying: “In short, the state of American diplomatic frenzy led personally by President Joe Biden and his Secretary of State Anthony Blinken these days, to urgently reach a ceasefire.” The fire and exchange of prisoners between the Hamas movement and the Zionist enemy entity comes not out of mercy, or out of concern to stop the war of genocide and ethnic cleansing in the Gaza Strip, but rather for purely American internal reasons imposed by the student revolution in the rising American universities, and it could lead to a civil war, comprehensive and radical change. “In the American political map that has been rooted since the end of World War II, its most prominent title is absolute support for the occupying entity and preventing its fall.”

He added: “The deep American state is trembling in horror from the outbreak of this war, in the depths of its university citadels and from future rulers , voters, and its focus on the Zionist massacres that have been continuing for more than 205 days in the Gaza Strip, the escalation of its flames, and the expansion of its circle, whether within the United States itself or in various countries.” The universities of the world are therefore exercising unprecedented pressure on America’s Arab allies, especially the mediators in Egypt and Qatar, to accelerate reaching an agreement. Stopping the war in Gaza means stopping the revolution in American universities, reducing its dangers , ramifications, and nipping it in its cradle.”

Atwan stressed that this student revolution, which broke the false connection between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism, reminds this deep state that its counterpart, which exploded at the height of the Vietnam War era, was the one that played a major role in the American defeat and the overthrow of President Johnson, and its sister, which broke out in the universities. In 1968, it was France that overthrew President Charles de Gaulle, the hero of the liberation war in his country, and the same thing was repeated, represented by the overthrow of the apartheid regime in South Africa, and the transfer of the great leader Nelson Mandela from prison to the presidential residence.

The Zionist enemy entity is the largest recipient of American foreign aid since World War II, and according to official American indicators, the total aid provided by America to this entity between 1946 and 2023 amounted to about 158.6 billion dollars.

It is noteworthy that most of the American aid to this usurping entity goes to the military sector, as the volume of military aid between 1946 and 2023, according to official American estimates, amounted to about 114.4 billion dollars, in addition to about 9.9 billion dollars for missile defense.

Observers believe that American democracy will always remain lame, constantly losing influence until the fall of the dollar as the global reserve currency and the United States enters a paralyzing recession, at which time it will immediately face a massive contraction in its military machine.

J.A

Los Angeles police make no arrests clearing USC pro-Palestinian encampment

Los Angeles police in the United States cleared a pro-Palestine encampment at the University of Southern California on Sunday, but made no arrests.

World2 min read
The New Arab Staff & Agencies
05 May, 2024

No arrests were made while the Los Angeles police cleared a pro-Palestine encampment at University of Southern California [GETTY]

Los Angeles police made no arrests on Sunday while clearing a pro-Palestinian encampment at the University of Southern California, following arrests and turmoil at universities across the country over Israel's war on Gaza.

Other universities with graduation ceremonies on Sunday braced for more protests after dozens were arrested the previous day.

After USC requested assistance, police entered the encampment about 5 a.m. local time (1200 GMT) and worked with campus police to remove tents as students peacefully left the area, police said.

Campus protests have emerged as a new political flashpoint during a hotly contested and deeply divisive US election year. Police have arrested over 2,000 protesters at dozens of colleges around the country.

Mitch Landrieu, the national co-chair for President Joe Biden's reelection campaign, said on Sunday that Senator Bernie Sanders's comment comparing the college protests to those during the Vietnam War was an "over-exaggeration."

"This is a very different circumstance," Landrieu said on CNN. "However, that is not to say that this is not a very serious matter."

Many schools, including Columbia University in New York City, have called police to quell the protests.

Students and other protesters have called for universities to divest their financial ties to Israel and push for a ceasefire. In April, Los Angeles police arrested 93 people at USC after they cleared an earlier encampment.

Separately, there have been at least four bomb threats at New York area synagogues over the weekend, police said, but none have proven credible.

New York Governor Kathy Hochul said on X late Saturday: "We will not tolerate individuals sowing fear & antisemitism. Those responsible must be held accountable for their despicable actions."

More than 34,600 Palestinians have been killed in Israel's assault that has flattened the Palestinian territory, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

(Reuters)

From America to Australia, student protests for Gaza could be the last hope for Global North's redemption

Opinion: Egyptian-American activist Aya Hijazi argues that the campus protests for Gaza are an awakening that could shift the West towards justice in Palestine

Aya Hijazi
05 May, 2024

Students watch as pro-Israel protestors demonstrate outside the gates and student demonstrators occupy the pro-Palestinian "Gaza Solidarity Encampment" on the West Lawn of Columbia University in New York, NY on Thursday, April 25, 2024 [Getty]

As Israel’s genocidal campaign in Gaza enters its seventh month this week, adding to seventy-five years of incremental ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, the only ray of hope lies in raising voices loud enough to pierce the silence and invisibility that Israeli, US, and European institutions have attempted to impose between Gaza and engaged citizens worldwide. The student protests sweeping across Western campuses may be the best chance to achieve that.

On April 18, a few courageous Columbia University students captured the world's attention with an encampment for Palestine, intending to address US complicity in Gaza.

They chose not to resign themselves to watching the genocide unfold on their phones while no one intervened, or at the very least, to give voice to the silenced cries of Palestinians in Gaza and the millions worldwide who cry out for them.

A few weeks earlier, a long-anticipated but diluted Security Council resolution calling for a ceasefire in Gaza was embarrassingly disregarded and quickly forgotten, as if it had never happened. The United States abstained and then falsely labeled it non-binding.

An ICJ ruling warning of an impending genocide was also dismissed. The United States and most European powers continued to provide weapons and military aid to Israel’s genocidal regime while many cut funding to UNRWA, the UN agency responsible for providing relief to Gaza, based on discredited Israeli allegations.

Global intifada for Palestine

The students who spoke out against this surreal duplicity quickly triggered the repressive instincts of the US establishment.

Instead of upholding the ethos of liberal education, where students learn how to "make the world a better place," one where genocides should not occur, Columbia University President Minouche Shafik - a British Egyptian woman - took a remarkably illiberal step and called on the notorious New York Police Department to suppress their students' voices.

Though I condemn her actions as a longtime activist interested in grassroots movements, I anticipated that her actions would backfire. If you want to inspire free spirits and fuel their movements, then apply force against them.

Sure enough, the brave and dedicated Columbia students were inspired to continue and expand their actions. In a rare moment of hope, pro-Palestine encampments spread rapidly across the United States and spilled over into Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Spain, and even Australia.

A global intifada for Palestine was ignited.

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Inside Columbia's pro-Palestinian student encampment
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Brooke Anderson

Last hope for a generation?

The world, but more importantly, the betrayed and forsaken free spirits in Gaza, felt the solidarity. University students in the United States are finally able to amplify their voices loud enough to break through the anti-Palestinian barriers of US institutions.

US universities and the government, from the executive to the legislative, have responded so far in ways reminiscent of the dictators they like to denounce, in two profound ways.

The first is through physical force, suppression, intimidation, and the arrest of student protesters.

The second is through defamation. The White House and mainstream media quickly denounced protests as anti-Semitic and uninformed. The US House of Representatives passed a bill redefining anti-Semitism as a radical anti-free speech measure intended to grant sweeping powers to the federal government to crack down on protests.

Yet, at this critical time, where the pendulum of history swings between progress and the liberation of natives from oblivion through settler colonialism, and their complete annihilation as a people with an identity, we must align ourselves with hope—the voices of university students echoing the cries of Palestinians in Gaza, unafraid to demand full liberation.

As the horrors of an imminent invasion of Rafah loom, so does the awakening of citizens in the Global North from indoctrination and therefore complicity in the horrors of Zionism. Yet, this prompts us to wonder: How long can US institutions ignore the awakening and continue to crack down on its leaders and fabricate lies about them as they have consistently done about Palestinians?

With all eyes on Gaza, how the United States responds to its students fighting for Gaza, and how history unfolds, will determine, at least for this generation, whether there is any hope in justice and humanity, or if it is all in vain.

US institutions, if not for the sake of justice but for their own survival, must embark on a path of self-correction. Otherwise, they will find themselves losing credibility with their population and future generations.

University students must persevere for this reason, and I have faith that they will. Their struggle is not symbolic, nor only for the sake of solidarity, but is one where their righteous fight can bend the arc of history towards justice, progress, and liberation.

With all eyes on Gaza, how the United States responds to its students fighting for Gaza, and how history unfolds, will determine, at least for this generation, whether there is any hope in justice and humanity, or if it is all in vain.

Aya Hijazi is an Egyptian American activist. She holds a Master’s degree in Public Administration from the Harvard Kennedy School as well as degrees in law and Conflict Analysis and Resolution. During the Arab Spring, she returned to Egypt where she established an NGO, Belady--An Island for Humanity. After the coup, police forces raided Belady and arrested Aya; she was imprisoned on fabricated charges for three years and was released after her case received international attention. She is now back in the US where she restarted Belady with a mission to defend human rights and freedom.

Follow her on X @ItsAyaHijazi

Inside a 'peaceful and proud' Gaza protest camp at a UK university

THEY ARE ALL PEACEFUL

Ashitha Nagesh,Community affairs correspondent,@ashnagesh

BBC

BBC/Ashitha NageshFrank has been camped outside Newcastle University since Wednesday

On a quiet morning outside Newcastle University, a small group of students listen to a lecturer talk about the opening song from Aladdin.

Specifically, this line: “It’s barbaric, but hey! It’s home.” She’s telling the group about Edward Said, and how his work looking at the way Middle Eastern cultures had been depicted in the West could be applied even to Disney films.

The talk then turns to how Said's theories could be applied to the portrayal of Palestinians in Western media.

While this scene doesn't sound out of the ordinary, this isn’t your usual university seminar. This lecturer was giving her talk in the middle of an encampment, which university students set up on Wednesday to protest against the war in Gaza.

Here in Newcastle, about 40 students have set up camp on the university’s quadrangle, with tents for sleeping, a makeshift first-aid centre, and tables for all the snacks donated by supporters - including crisps, water, and a Colin the Caterpillar cake.

Students themselves do coursework or exam revision on the grass, or slip off for seminars and lectures, as they would if it were student halls. Several staff members come in to show their support and drop off donations of snacks. All of those I speak to tell me they feel “proud” to see their students taking part.

BBC/Ashitha NageshPeople have been donating snacks and supplies to the protesters

Running along the perimeter are hand-painted signs.

Naomi, who’s asked that we don’t use her full name, shows me a sign that she’d painted the night before.

“It says ‘Tzedek, Tzedek, Tirdof’,” she tells me. “It means ‘justice, justice, shall you seek’.”

Naomi says the sign - written in Hebrew - reflects how her Jewish faith has shaped her view of the conflict in Gaza.

“I was always raised with a very strong sense of justice, because of my Jewish community,” she explains, adding that the sign “encompasses so much of what my Judaism means to me”.

“In many ways, if I hadn’t been Jewish, I wouldn’t feel so firmly in solidarity with Palestine, because of the sense of social justice that my faith gives me.”

Newcastle students are just one of many student bodies across the country to set up similar occupied protests this week.

Similar outdoor camps have been erected on campuses including at Leeds, Manchester and Sheffield, while a camp outside Warwick University has been in place for 10 days. At Goldsmiths, University of London, students have occupied the library, inside the university building.

Earlier this week the Union of Jewish Students (UJS) released a statement saying campus protests in support of Gaza were creating a “hostile and toxic atmosphere for Jewish students”.

Guy Dabby-Joory, from the UJS, told me they knew there were Jewish supporters of the movement, but that they’d heard a lot of concerns from members.

These UK protests have sprung up amid the backdrop of much larger demonstrations and occupations on campuses across the US - most prominently at Columbia University, New York, and at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).

Those protests have seen more than 2,000 people detained over the past fortnight.

BBC/Ashitha NageshNaomi's sign includes a Hebrew slogan for justice

While the calmness of the Newcastle camp feels a million miles away from those scenes, those who are taking part tell me that their counterparts in the US have seen what they’re doing, and have been in touch.

“We’ve had some people from Columbia message us,” Frank, another student protester, tells me. Frank’s pronouns are they/them, and they asked that we not use their real name. “They just wanted to send us their solidarity - and that is really warming to see.”

They say the group behind the occupation - Newcastle Apartheid Off Campus - had been organising in support of Gaza for several months, and that the occupation was planned before the recent disorder kicked off in the US. But the occupation was partly organised now to say to US students: “You’re not alone.”

Students in the UK share some common goals with their US counterparts - in particular, the call for their universities to sever financial and research ties with Israel, a process known as divestment.

But as well as this, Frank tells me they feel an emotional connection to students in Gaza - who, in better times, are no different to them.

“There are tens of thousands of students in Gaza, and their lives are completely upended. There's no way you can pursue an education when you've got bombs raining down on you,” Frank said.

“We’re sat in a peaceful university, studying, and they don’t have that opportunity.”

More UK students occupy campuses, in Gaza protest

Police fired gun while clearing Columbia University protest

Although it’s quiet now, rallies that are held at 5pm daily attract hundreds of other students. Frank estimates there were around 200 people at the last one.

I ask one of the staff members - Dr Jemima Repo, a reader in political and feminist theory - whether she worries at all about the camp becoming disruptive during exam season.

“No, not at all,” she says. The camp itself, while on the campus and visible, is set apart from walkways and entrances.

“As far as I understand the relationship between campus security and police has been very good,” Dr Repo says, adding that there haven’t been any tensions among staff, either.

BBC/Ashitha NageshDr Mori Ram has family in Israel, near the border with Lebanon

The university, meanwhile, says it “respects the right to peaceful protests and freedom of speech” and that they are “engaging with protesters”.

“Our priority is always to ensure that our campus remains safe for everyone and protests should be within the law - we do not tolerate the use of threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour that causes, or is likely to cause, distress,” it said in a statement this week.

Risk assessors also come by the camp while I’m there to make sure things are still peaceful, and that there aren’t any health and safety issues.

Lecturer Dr Mori Ram also comes to chat to students and show his support. He’s originally from Israel, and has family near the border with Lebanon.

The 7 October attacks by Hamas, and the Israeli bombardment of Gaza in the months since, have deeply affected him.

“To be honest, for the first time, I feel shame. My family is there… everything that happens there, they are exposed,” Dr Ram says.

“I do think that encampments like this, and what's happening right now in the US, may provide the necessary political pressure on the Israeli government to hopefully bring things to an end, in a good way.”

But Dr Mori says he knows he’s “not a representative of the majority of Israelis” with his views on the conflict.

Mr Dabby-Joory, from the UJS, said that "Jewish students, like all student communities, are broad and diverse, and there are a range of views in the Jewish student community".

“But I think many Jewish students are feeling unwelcome, uncomfortable and on edge," he said.

“That doesn’t mean that every student is feeling it, but we know from speaking to so many of our 9,000 students across the country that so many of them are feeling those things while on campus.”

The tensions within the community, and between others from her faith and those from her political groups, have affected Naomi too.

“It’s incredibly isolating,” she tells me.

“One of the slogans that’s often used [by Jewish pro-Palestinian activists] is ‘not in my name’. And I think, well, why should it be in anyone's name.

“It's also been an incredibly isolating experience to see the reaction to pro-Palestinian activism by other Jewish people, personally and in the wider world.

“It's been quite difficult at times to feel that sense of community, which has been such a big part of my upbringing.”

Pro-Palestine Student Protests Spread Despite Repression

MONDAY 29 APRIL 2024,

BY DAN LA BOTZ

Thousands of students at dozens of campuses across the United States participated in April and continue today to join in pro-Palestine protests leading in some cases to brutal police repression, arrests, and suspensions or expulsions from the university.

The protests began at Columbia University, then spread to other elite private universities such as Yale and Harvard, and the University of Southern California, but soon included state universities such as the University of California campuses at Berkeley and Los Angeles and the University of Michigan, At Columbia, at Emory University in Atlanta, and at the University of Texas at Austin, police in riot gear broke up encampments on the campuses, beat and arrested students. On some campuses, police also arrested professors.

The student movement began as a demonstration of solidarity with the Palestinian people, calling for a “ceasefire now” and for an end to U.S. funding for Israel’s military. Quickly students also demanded that their universities divest from Israeli businesses, especially intelligence and arms makers, and some also called for an end to academic ties to Israeli institutions. Students pitched tents and set up camp in university plazas, engaging in peaceful protests. They didn’t engage in violence, did not damage property, and hardly interrupted university operations at all. Many of the protestors were both Palestinians and Jews, but also a diverse range of others.

College presidents, other university administrators, politicians, and some media characterized the demonstrations as anti-Semitic, claimed they were intimidating and threatening Jewish students, and alleged they were violent. Columbia University president Dr. Nemat Shafik was the first to call in the police, leading to beatings and arrests, outraging the students and many faculty members. Hundreds were arrested on various campuses around the country. While there doubtless some anti-Semitic remarks, they were rare exceptions and the demonstrations were fundamentally anti-Zionist and did not threaten Jewish students.

“Students are here because it has been over 200 days of watching a genocide unfold. Because people are tired of seeing their friends get beaten, arrested, suspended, and expelled for daring to use their voices to end their university’s complicity in the system,” says Cyn, a student at UC Berkeley. “Every year our universities send millions and millions of dollars to companies who manufacture weapons and surveillance equipment used to harass, intimidate, and brutalize Palestinians, and then our universities turn those same tactics on us. Our solidarity goes out to everyone fighting for a free Palestine.”

Mike Johnson, speaker of the House, in a shocking and unprecedented political move, went to Columbia University and spoke, calling the pro-Palestine protestors “a mob” that had threatened Jewish students and “supported terrorists.” He demanded that Columbia University president Shafik either bring the protests under control or resign. Republican Senators Tom Cotton of Arkansas and Josh Hawley of Missouri, called for troops to be sent in to crush the pro-Palestine campus protests.

Other protests calling for an immediate ceasefire and an end to U.S. funding for Israel continue to take place, such as the one I joined, a seder-protest held in front of the Brooklyn home of Senate Democratic majority leader Chuck Schumer, which blocked a major thoroughfare and led to 300 arrested.

Despite the repression, students appear to be determined to continue the protests and to force their universities to divest from Israel and to stop their government from aiding the Israeli military. But classes end in May. Where will the movement go? Some plan to go to the Democratic Party Convention in Chicago on August 19–22. Will it be another 1968?

28 April 2024

ATTACHED DOCUMENTS

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Dan La Botz was a founding member of Teamsters for a Democratic Union (TDU). He is the author of Rank-and-File Rebellion: Teamsters for a Democratic Union (1991). He is also a co-editor of New Politics and editor of Mexican Labor News and Analysis.

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