Letters the Week of Feb. 5, 2015

It is a shame that too many pundits and editorial writers do not realize that there is a factor in Benjamin Netanyahu’s actions that goes beyond politics or “personality clashes” (Editorial, “Staying on Target,” Jan. 29). They do not seem to understand that he is utterly convinced that, regardless of his intentions, Obama’s policy is leading Israel and then the United States and other Western democracies to a catastrophe.

 

His late father, Benzion Netanyahu, was a renowned professor of history at Dropsie College, Cornell University and the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. But when he was in his late 20s, he was personal secretary to a prominent Zionist leader named Vladimir Jabotinsky. The media now tend to forget that during the 1930s Winston Churchill was being ignored, derided and denounced in England and France for his repeated grim warnings about the objective of Hitler and the Nazis. During those same years, Jabotinsky was going through eastern Europe exhorting his Jewish audiences to “get out of Europe” because they were on the verge of a catastrophe. He also was ignored, derided and bitterly denounced.

 

 

Your editorial (“A Reminder to Act,” Jan. 22) appropriately pointed out that our generation has an obligation not only to remember the Holocaust but also to take “steps to ensure that such barbarity not be permitted to exist in our world.”

 

As recently as Jan. 20, a senior Iranian military official, Maj. Gen. Mohammad Ali Jafari, told Iranian Television that “the Zionists should await annihilating thunderbolts,” and he pledged to seek “full removal of this very epitome of evil from the geopolitics of the region.” 

 

The American Jewish community must, as your editorial urged, take “steps to ensure that such barbarity not be permitted to exist.” Those steps should include full support for congressional efforts to impose sanctions on Iran if it continues its nuclear development. Trusting Iranian promises is not enough; there have to be real consequences for Iran’s actions.

 

 

I just received the Jan. 22 edition of the Exponent, and while I have noticed over the past several years that the paper pushes the envelope when it comes to editorial content relevant to modern Jewish practice, I never expected kashrut to be totally disregarded. Always looking for something new and tasty in the food and recipe articles, I was shocked to find a recipe for “Crispy Shredded Chili Beef” with sirloin steak as one of the ingredients. 

 

As good as it may taste, sirloin is not kosher because it comes from the hindquarter; the last time I checked, hindquarter meat still isn’t kosher. Even though I find it more than a little odd that meat from one part of an otherwise kosher animal isn’t kosher, I have to respect what rabbinic Judaism says about that because I do observe kashrut. So should the Exponent when reviewing content to be published in a newspaper for a Jewish audience.