Jewish Suspicions of Christians

On Sunday, a small group from Sioux Falls went to Minneapolis to the Living Word Christian Center for "A Night to Honor Israel." I am still mulling over my thoughts on this wonderful evening. I expect I will blog on the entire evening in the near future.The featured speaker for the evening was Dennis Prager, to me a tower of Jewish thought and wisdom. I wish everyone could view his entire speech. One of the thoughts that he discussed, I found on YouTube from a similar address that he gave. In this short video, he simplistically explains to both Christians and Jews why Jews are so reticent to believe that Christians can truly love Israel and the Jewish people. I hope that you will take the time to watch this short video and then examine your own views.

The False Religion of Mideast Peace - Aaron David Miller

This is a very long article in Foreign Policy Magazine. While the length is oppressive, the thoughts are instructive. He basically leaves one with the impression that currently, peace between Israel and the Palestinians and Israel and the Arabs is unattainable. With all of the complex problems facing the US both at home and abroad, we cannot bring enough focus to work with the parties to solve this problem. He does not say it specifically but only another war will create the needs to find a chance for peace. The two times that great progress was made was following the 1973 Yom Kippur War, which led to peace between Israel and Egypt, and following the Gulf War when we began the Oslo Process. Barring such catastrophic events, we will remain stuck in a quagmire. He does not say we should give up but we should have a realistic understanding of where we are at.


For information on the author, Aaron David Miller, you might look at the Wikipedia post on him:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaron_David_Miller


A small excerpt from the article:


I can't tell you how many times in the past 20 years, as an intelligence analyst, policy planner, and negotiator, I wrote memos to Very Important People arguing the centrality of the Arab-Israeli issue and why the U.S. needed to fix it. Today, I couldn't write those same memos or anything like them with a clear conscience or a straight face. The notion that there's a single or simple fix to protecting U.S. interests, let alone that Arab-Israeli peace would, like some magic potion, make it all better, is just flat wrong. In a broken, angry region with so many problems, it stretches the bounds of credulity to the breaking point to argue that settling the Arab-Israeli conflict is the most critical issue, or that its resolution would somehow guarantee Middle East stability.


A brilliant, empathetic president has made America the focal point of action and responsibility for the Arab-Israeli issue at a time when the country may be least able to do much about it. The painful truth is that faith in America's capacity to fix the Arab-Israeli issue has always been overrated. It's certainly no coincidence that every breakthrough from the Egypt-Israel treaty to the Oslo accords to the Israel-Jordan peace agreement came initially as a consequence of secret meetings about which the U.S. was the last to know. 


The link to this article :
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/04/19/the_false_religion_of_mideast_peace

Bravo Google!!

I don't know if you read Google's blog, but I receive in my RSS feeds. I think that it's a good post to receive. These 2 recent articles discuss the way Google handles requests from governments and censorship. If you believe that knowledge is power as I do, you have to cheer for Google in doing all it can to keep information flowing. I am not advocating that Google is totally altruistic. This may just be a response to the mess with China but I think this is the right thing to do. So Bravo Google!! 
If you have the time, enjoy these two posts.
Greater transparency around government requests

4/20/2010 11:04:00 AM

Article 19 of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights states that "everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers." Written in 1948, the principle applies aptly to today's Internet -- one of the most important means of free expression in the world. Yet government censorship of the web is growing rapidly: from the outright blocking and filtering of sites, to court orders limiting access to information and legislation forcing companies to self-censor content. 

To read the rest of the blog:

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/04/greater-transparency-around-government.html

Controversial content and free expression on the web: a refresher

4/19/2010 09:23:00 AM

Two and a half years ago, we outlined our approach to removing content from Google products and services. Our process hasn’t changed since then, but our recent decision to stopcensoring search on Google.cn has raised new questions about when we remove content, and how we respond to censorship demands by governments. So we figured it was time for a refresher.

To read the rest of the blog:

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/04/controversial-content-and-free.html

Disconnect

This poll just proves a point that I have been discussing for several years. We Americans do not like the way that our government in Washington works. The disconnect is that whenever there is a problem Washington is the place we turn for the solution. We have tried a Republican controlled Congress and Administration. We are now trying a Democrat controlled Congress and Administration. We have tried a divided Congress and Administration. Whatever we have tried, our politicians have not gotten the message. We want them to work together to find common sense solutions to our problems. Since they have missed that message, it seems to me that we need to take the responsibility back upon ourselves. We, the people, need to demand more local control to implement common sense solutions. Unfortunately, this is easier said than done and the political animosity found in Washington has filtered down to the states. We will continue to find it easier to complain than take responsibility.  

Poll: 4 out of 5 Americans don't trust Washington

By LIZ SIDOTI (AP) – 1 hour ago

WASHINGTON — America's "Great Compromiser" Henry Clay called government "the great trust," but most Americans today have little faith in Washington's ability to deal with the nation's problems.

Public confidence in government is at one of the lowest points in a half century, according to a survey from the Pew Research Center. Nearly 8 in 10 Americans say they don't trust the federal government and have little faith it can solve America's ills, the survey found.

To read the entire article, click on the link below:

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jd_jiGbsExSJ0dfp1Na1YjnRJsfgD9F64DD80

Legislative suicide? - Senior Beacon - Washington, DC

While attending the annual AIPAC Policy Conference in March, I reconnected with a cousin of mine, Stuart Rosenthal, also originally from Fort Worth. As you can see from the link, Stuart is a successful publisher of a Senior newspaper in the Washington, DC area. Here is an editorial from his most recent publication discussing the problems of the deficit and senior programs. His editorial is timely and poignant.


http://seniorb.md.newsmemory.com/default.php?goTo=1&selDate=20100401


You may have to click on page 2 to get to this editorial.


Legislative suicide?

As publisher of the Beacon and chair of the Maryland Commission on Aging, I am used to advocating for programs and serv ices that address the needs of the region’s older adults.

Most of the time, that means lobbying for more govern ment funds.

So today, I want to lobby for something that may seem surprising: I want to ask our government leaders to face facts and address the dire structural, financial crisis our country is facing, even though that means we aging advocates will also have to face some unpleasant facts.

When I advocate for senior programs, I talk about the demographic realities of our aging population. I point out wherever I can how much our increasing longevity and the huge population bulge created by the 78 million baby boomers are changing the makeup of our society.

In 10 years, Maryland will look like Florida does today (with nearly one in five adults 65 and over). Fairfax County, Vir ginia is aging even faster than Mont gomery County and Prince George’s Counties in Maryland.

And as our “senior class” is growing fast, our working class and numbers of school age children are growing much more slowly or even shrinking.

This huge, but gradual, de mographic shift means we need to focus now on how to revise our government spend ing priorities, diverting more of our resources toward those in later life.

Even before our current recession, I often encountered deep denial of these facts among legislators and bureaucrats. But today, in themidst of constant budget short falls, things are even worse. Now cuts are being made in senior programs (as in al most all other government spending) even as the numbers and needs are rising.

And when it comes to national problems like funding for Social Security and Medicare, the pressures are even greater. Medicare’s hospital insurance fund has been facing annual deficits since 2008, and Social Security is heading for them shortly. In fact, it appears that even this year, So cial Security will be $28 billion in the hole (taking in that much less in Social Security taxes than it pays out in benefits in 2010) ac cording to business columnist Allan Sloan.

Many types of solutions have been pro posed to address Social Security’s prob lems: push off the retirement age, tax high er levels of income, raise payroll taxes, re duce benefits. There are also proposals for addressingMedicare’s shortfalls.

But these aren’t painless, and legislators won’t risk their reelection by even sug gesting that such things need to be done to preserve the programs.

Instead, Congress appears to be heaping fuel on the fire by passing expensive new entitlement programs in the healthcare arena. Yes, the recent legislation holds out the promise of cost savings in the long run, but much of those will materialize only if Congress acts in ways in the future that it hasn’t been able to in the past.

And what about the even larger prob lem of reining in federal deficits generally (now exceeding a trillion dollars a year)?

In an effort to address these while pre venting blame from attaching to individual members, Congress briefly contemplated appointing a bipartisan commission that would presumably call for a combination of spending cuts and tax increases. Congress would then take a single vote on the entire package of suggested solutions.

While it was a cowardly and constitu tionally suspect way of addressing the issue, at least it was an attempt. But Con gress couldn’t even agree to the commis sion!

So President Obama has appointed a bi partisan presidential commission instead: One that doesn’t obligate Congress to vote on its results.

But this commission doesn’t face the facts, either. Its official task is to eliminate the federal deficit by 2015 — not counting interest payments on the national debt. Ac cording to the administration, the project ed 2015 deficit would be $752 billion— but $571 billion of that is for the interest pay ments that aren’t counted, according to columnist Robert J. Samuelson.

So even if the commission were to solve its stated problem, it would only address 24 percent of the deficit in 2015, and make no progress toward reducing the accumulated national debt, much less addressing long termneeds of Social Security andMedicare. What will it take to get our so-called lead ers motivated to do what needs to be done? Do we need our legislators to make a sui cide pact, with everymember willing to risk his or her job to get it done? Or do we need a more enlightened electorate, willing to re ward representatives whomake difficult de cisions rather than call for their ouster?

The decisions we need to make as a so ciety will result in short-term pain, no doubt. They will anger and possibly hurt many of those we care most about. But painful measures can’t be put off forever, and they can be mitigated by careful ad vance planning.

The time to start that planning has long since come.

I invite you to share your thoughts on this subject, or any others of concern to you, by writing us at: Letters to the Editor, The Beacon, P.O. Box 2227, Silver Spring, MD 20915-2227, or info@TheBeaconNewspapers.com. 

Attending a reunion?

We’d like to hear from you if you are planning or attending a high school or col lege reunion in the area, or if you’ve recent ly attended one. Please contact our manag ing editor, Barbara Ruben, by calling (301) 949-9766 or e-mailingbarbara@theBeaconNewspapers.com.

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FROM THE PUBLISHER 

By Stuart P. Rosenthal

I admit that I have not been a great fan of President Obama. He is, however, my president and I expect him to uphold our democracy’s highest ideals. This article, from the Washington Post, is just a continuation of the arrogance that this administration has shown in its style of governing. The greatest example of this arrogance was the health care debate. The President promised the American people that it would be totally open for all the world to see. We would be able to watch the committees on C-Span. The text would be published on the internet for the public to read. When the bill was decided behind closed doors and members were bought off to vote for it, I was and still am outraged. This article shows, to me, a President and an administration that believes it knows best in all areas and will only tell us what it wants us to hear.

My hope is that others in the Fourth Estate will be as outraged as the reporter in this article and will use their paper and ink, blogs and newscasts to demand a more open administration. The citizens of the United States deserve nothing less.

Obama's disregard for media reaches new heights at nuclear summit

By Dana Milbank

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

World leaders arriving in Washington for President Obama's Nuclear Security Summit must have felt for a moment that they had instead been transported to Soviet-era Moscow.


They entered a capital that had become a military encampment, with camo-wearing military police in Humvees and enough Army vehicles to make it look like a May Day parade on New York Avenue, where a bicyclist was killed Monday by a National Guard truck.


In the middle of it all was Obama -- occupant of an office once informally known as "leader of the free world" -- putting on a clinic for some of the world's greatest dictators in how to circumvent a free press.


To read the entire article, click on the link below:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/13/AR2010041303067.html

Ticked

I really do not want to turn my blog into a strictly Pro-Israel blog. I have always said that I am extremely Pro-Israel but I would like to think that I have other issues that are also important to me. But reading this article from the BBC just really ticks me off. For a change I am not mad at the BBC but at the event.

If this was the first time that Hamas or the Palestinians had "mistakenly" reported a death blamed on the Israelis, I could forgive and forget it. This was not the first or the second or the tenth. They have a pattern of blaming Israel for events that we find out later did not happen. I am sure that this article absolving Israel will not make it to the Arab street. Actually it will not make it to most of the world as it is not shocking. So much for my ranting as most of the world just does not care.

Gaza boy reported killed returns home alive.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8601925.stm

A True Hero Interviewed

Photo by: Ariel Jerozolimski

In the attached article, Natan Sharansky, Chairman of the Jewish Agency for Israel, talks about Passover, connection between Israel and the Diaspora and Jewish identity and freedom. This interview is a moving statement of the Jewish world from the perspective of the man most in charge of aliyah to Israel and promoting Jewish education in the Diaspora.

Why a True Hero? Natan Sharansky was a Jewish Refusenik in the Former Soviet Union. Because of his work on Human Rights and Jewish Emigration there, he was imprisoned in the Gulag. For 7 years of the approximately 8 years he was imprisoned, I wore a bracelet as a reminder of his imprisonment. Like many others, I spent time writing letters to and visiting with our federal representatives on his and other Refuseniks' behalf. Whenever our national representatives met with the leaders of the Soviet Union, the freeing of the Refuseniks and the allowing of Jewish emigration was always on the list.

The cause of the Refuseniks in the United States was not just a Jewish cause. Other groups who believe in freedom, justice and democracy also took up the cause. I remember being at a National Young Republican meeting in Washington, DC where Congressman Jack Kemp told the group that if they believed in these ideals, they needed to take up this cause. Trust me when I tell you that this was not a Jewish group. I was probably the only Jewish member attending this conference of approximately 800 people.

Sharansky was the symbol of standing up to authoritarian dictatorship. He was cruelly punished. He never gave up and finally was freed. In my opinion, a true hero.

I hope that you find this interview in the Jerusalem Post interesting. The link to the article is posted below:
http://www.jpost.com/Features/InThespotlight/Article.aspx?id=172404

Success

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same;

                                      -From If by Rudyard Kipling

I have to admit that when working on something as intently as getting the Iran Divestment bill passed in the South Dakota Legislature, it is difficult not to feel pride. I am grateful that our efforts were successful. So many people were involved in the bill’s passage, that I can only take a very small bit of the credit. Should I feel great for the success or should I feel great because of what this bill represents? Doing what we can to assist our troops is what is most important. This was the issue when we started and is still the issue. At home we do not put our lives on the line day in and day out. Stopping the funding to the terrorists is the least that we can do.

Congratulations to the South Dakota Legislature for passing this bill, the governor for signing it and to all of those who lent their voice supporting this effort. 

Pro-Active for Israel

I just returned from the American Israel Public Affairs (AIPAC) Policy Conference in Washington, DC. Like many AIPAC conferences, most of the attention focused on the issues of the day. Today the issues are crippling sanctions against Iran to entice it to stop its efforts to attain a nuclear weapons capability; recommitment to a strong US – Israel Alliance; and passing the foreign aid bill with its 3 billion dollars in aid to Israel. These issues are the same as in the past many years with some different nuances. We have many friends in both houses of Congress on both sides of the aisle but the support of local constituents lobbying on these issues has a great impact.

Most of the speeches over the 3 day conference focused on these important topics or on the miracle of Israel. The most important speech to me was delivered by Howard Kohr, Executive Director of AIPAC. While covering the importance of these issues and our need to lobby on them, he began a discussion on being pro-active for Israel.

Here is the link to both the video and the transcript of his speech.

http://www.aipac.org/PC2010/webPlayer/mon_kohr10.asp

About half-way through the speech, you will find this paragraph which segues into the pro-active ideas.

“In the language of doctors that doctors use to diagnose dangerous conditions; these challenges are acute asserting an urgency we deny only at our peril. But doctors also know that there are conditions equally dangerous—not acute, but chronic. The damage they do is slower, toxic; in the end deeply damaging—even deadly. Make no mistake; we will maintain our focus on Iran as the number one item on our agenda. [Applause] We will continue to help Israel pursue her quest for peace and security with her neighbors. And we will work to continue to strengthen the bonds between the United States and Israel. But these acute challenges exist in a broader context. And it is the chronic problems that I also want to talk about this morning.”

We need a public relations campaign. We can no longer allow our detractors the open field. We must challenge their lies and half-truths with the light of truth. We must not allow ourselves the reflexive response of self-doubt. If our opponents’ arguments have a small element of truth, we must not allow that to be a wedge to stop us from providing the entire story.

Howard does not talk specifically about the story of the Muhammad Dura but I believe it to be they type of journalism we want to prevent. A French television network filmed a video in which they show this young boy being killed in a cross-fire exchange between Israel and the Palestinians. The film leads you to believe that the Israelis murdered him. Shortly after this video came out, the world was outraged at Israel. In response the Israelis showed that it was impossible due to the angle of where Muhammad was to have been hit by Israeli bullets. 5 years later after a lawsuit in France forced the French television network release the entire video footage we get to see what really happened. Not only was Muhammad Dura not killed by Israeli cross-fire, he was not killed at all. At the end of the video he just gets up and walks away. Where is the outrage to being lied to? To be pro-active, we must remind the world that our detractors have lied before. When we hear the next outrage, will we demand conclusive evidence before we believe the event or not?

Howard you are absolutely correct. We be pro-active. We need to tell Israel’s story for the entire world to marvel at. We must demand the truth from our detractors and have them explain any fallacies from the past. Other groups have talked about being pro-active for Israel, but I believe that AIPAC will get the job done.

A New Day

Does the Obama Administration wake up every morning and think that the world was just created again? Do they think that they can organize the world as they believe it ought to be? We could discuss this on just about every important issue facing the United States today, but I want to focus on the issue that I have been following for most of my adult life. The issue today is Israel and the Palestinians.

Last week, Israel announced that it would allow construction of 1600 housing units in the eastern part of Jerusalem in a Jewish neighborhood while Vice President Joe Biden was visiting the country. Current United States policy is against any construction in territory that Israel conquered in the Six Day War in 1967. This announcement embarrassed the Vice President. Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, immediately apologized for the announcement coming as it did and embarrassing the Vice President. The Vice President formally accepted the Prime Minister’s apology.

Obviously, the Vice President forgot to check in with the President and the Secretary of State before accepting the apology. Upon his return home, Ms. Clinton after meeting with the President, called Prime Minister Netanyahu and dressed him down for the announcement. She said that he was insincere in attempting to hold negotiations with the Palestinians. She demanded that he cancel the construction project and wanted to know what other concessions he would give to the Palestinians to get them to the negotiating table.

Did they just wake up to a new day? Is history unimportant? Since his election as Prime Minister, Mr. Netanyahu has been calling for negotiations with the Palestinians. The Palestinian Authority has used many excuses not to come to the table. Why has this administration not held their feet to the fire to negotiate? Now I know that this is probably way too long ago for this administration to remember but in 2000 then Prime Minister Ehud Barak offered the Palestinians a peace deal that was considered overly generous. Even President Clinton condemned Palestinian Chairman Arafat from walking away from the proposal. Chairman Arafat did not make a counter proposal. He just walked away. I guess that is too long ago for the Secretary of State to remember. Israel has formally made offers even before 2000 to solve this conflict but has never had a willing partner.

What have the Palestinians done? How far back does one need to go? Just this week in Ramallah, the current seat of the Palestinian Authority, they renamed a square in honor of a terrorist who was directly responsible in the cold blooded murder of 38 Israelis including 13 children. I do not recall seeing a condemnation of the Palestinians. I could talk about how they call for the destruction of Israel in their mosques and call Jews pigs and monkeys who deserve to be destroyed. I could talk about the celebrations in the past when suicide bombers murdered innocent Israelis in their terror attacks. Remembering these events is just unimportant, I guess. History does not matter.

Well it is a new day. If those damn Israelis would just give up a piece here and there. We are not asking for anything really important.  They can always count on the United States to come to their aid. We always do what we say. Our word is golden. Who does Israel think it is by not doing these little things for us?

Well tomorrow is another day. Maybe the Administration will see this issue in a new light. Maybe we will remember who our friends are. Or maybe some other issue will be important. 

Surreal

While I was walking in Vienna, I told Deborah that in many respects my trip was surreal. Consider that I had left Sioux Falls a few days before. Sioux Falls is a city that is not quite 150 years old. We were walking in Vienna that was established by the Romans as a fortress on the edge of the eastern Alps not quite 2000 years ago. Shortly I was going to Israel. I would be in Jerusalem that we know was King David’s Capitol 3000 years ago and is at least 4000 years old as the bible tells us Abraham was there. I would be driving by Jericho (in the Palestinian Authority area so I was not going to enter), probably the oldest city in the world at nearly 10,000 years old. To think how much history has unfolded at these various places and the span of their lifetimes for a simple man from South Dakota is just mind boggling and surreal.

Sioux Falls to Dimona and Back

Rachel Rachamim with students and Rachel and Kochava Asraf

How quickly time flies! I returned to Sioux Falls last Monday, just a week ago, and it seems like forever that I was in Vienna and Israel. How I long to be again soaking in the waters of the Dead Sea but I will leave that blog for another time.

If you read my previous post, you already know a bit about our relationship. As Dimona and the Network are a Perfect Match, the crown jewel for me, personally, is the relationship developing between Eugene Field School in Sioux Falls and Ami-asaaf School in Dimona. These schools are both Art Magnet (art immersion) schools for their respective communities. Twinning gives these children a chance to learn about a different culture and environment. But kids are kids and art is art no matter where in the world one is.

The story begins last year when Carol and I were vacationing in Israel. Before we left, we had contacted our Network representatives about going to Dimona and seeing what our partnership was doing. We saw several sites but were struck by the reception at Ami-asaaf School. Carol dutifully posted our pictures on Facebook. A local friend of ours, Sara Crosby, saw the post. They had a chance to get together in Sioux Falls and Sara told Carol that we have a similar school here. Being our children have been out of the school system for about 15 years, we had no idea. Sara contacted the school and organized a meeting. Our ideas were received with great enthusiasm. The administration, staff and parents thought that this was a great idea. Many thanks go to Sara.

I contacted Ami-asaaf. Not being in Israel, I do not know what they individually thought but the return email was is a great idea. Summer came and the school year started and the two schools were still trying to get all of the connections made. Emails are being exchanged and the excitement is building. Before I left for my Big trip, I picked up at Eugene Field School letters and artwork from the students to take to Dimona. The box took up a large portion of my suitcase. I was thrilled.

Upon arrival in Dimona, my very first stop was Ami-asaaf School. The teachers, staff and children are so wonderful. I again met Kochava Asraf, the principal and then Rachel Rachamim, English teacher and our liaison. You would have thought that I was a dignitary. I was greeted by a choir who serenaded me. I recorded a portion of their singing and have uploaded it to You Tube. I was next escorted to the English classroom where a saxophone ensemble played for me. I have also uploaded a portion of their performance to You Tube. Following this, I presented the children with my package from Eugene Field School. I wish I could describe the excitement. Like I said, kids are kids everywhere. To add to their excitement, I showed them pictures of all of the snow we have in Sioux Falls. They loved it.

Before we were done, Rachel presented me with letters and art to bring back to Sioux Falls. I brought home as much, if not more, than I had taken. I did not know if I would be able to fit it in my suitcase, but I did not care. I was and am just so happy that this relationship is working and both schools are committed to making it grow.

When I returned home, I quickly made contact with Ann Henkhaus at Eugene Field School. I delivered her the package with all of the letters and art. She distributed this to the kids in the school. In visiting, she asked me to come to school and meet with the children to discuss my trip.

As I hope you can see, I am so very excited about all of the connections between Dimona and the Network. For me this local connection is the greatest but all of the ties are wonderful.

Dimona and the Network: A Perfect Match

I just returned from a wonderful trip that took me to Vienna, Austria and several places in Israel. The main purpose of my trip in Israel was to go to Dimona, a small city of about 40,000 in the middle of the Negev Desert. I came as a representative, officially the American Steering Chair of the Jewish Federations of North America (JFNA), to meet my Israeli counterpart, Professor Haim Kalman, see projects in which we are invested, and hear proposals for possible new projects.

Now that I have explained why I was in Dimona, I want to discuss this partnership and what makes it perfect. The Network is a confederation (my description) of approximately 350 small Jewish communities around North America with only lay leadership. We raise funds for distressed Jews in Israel and the Diaspora. Our contributions originally went to the United Jewish Appeal, then toits successor the United Jewish Communities and today to the Jewish Federations of North America. Not quite 20 years ago, a separate division was created, the Network. As I view it and I am sure if someone from JFNA reads this they will disagree, the Network is kind of the Ugly Duckling of the organization. As one would expect, JFNA, is run by the large federations. Many times I have met Jews from large Jewish communities and when I tell them I am from South Dakota they ask are there really Jews there? In the Network, we raise significant dollars but not by a New York, Los Angeles or other large Jewish community standard. Understandably, they cannot overlook our contributions, but likewise, being so small and spread out, what services can JFNA provide?

Dimona is a town established in the 1950s. As with other communities in the Negev, this town was the fulfillment of Israel’s first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion’s dream to populate the Negev. Israel, following her independence in 1948, absorbed hundreds of thousands of displaced Jews from Europe and the Arab world. While Ben-Gurion’s dream was great, the reality was that the government did not have the resources to fully take care of these immigrants. Over the last 12 years, I have been to Dimona 4 times and usually I get asked by Israelis why would I want to go there? Like the Network, Dimona is an Ugly Duckling of Israel.

In 1996, our parent organization and the Jewish Agency for Israel established partnerships between various Jewish communities outside of Israel with communities inside Israel. Dimona and the Network, the two Ugly Ducklings got each other. One could easily say that each got dumped on by its national organization. I disagree, we are a perfect match. We understand what a fight we have just to be recognized. Our adversity creates opportunities to find ways to work together for the betterment of both. While many of the larger North American communities may see their partnerships as just a philanthropic endeavor, ours can be a true partnership. The Network can help fund programs for the less fortunate in Dimona and Dimona can be the Network’s strong bond with Israel. As always, the devil is in the details. Together, we can face our challenges and our needs. Together, we can meet adversity and overcome it. Together, we can win for everyone. These two Ugly Ducklings were made for each other – a perfect match. And like the Ugly Duckling in the children’s story, we will grow into beautiful Swans.

Stress on Flying to a Foreign Land

My great adventure of going to Vienna and Israel is in progress. While I have already been in Vienna for 2 days, I think I will start out with a short story of paranoia about flying to a foreign land.

Actually the trip was pretty much uneventful. I left Sioux Falls on time and because of fog in Munich and Vienna, I arrived an hour and a half late. In the scheme of things that really is not too bad for a 5000 mile trip that was supposed to take about 14 hours.

My stress, self-inflicted, was flying from Munich to Vienna on Lufthansa Airlines. As all of the announcements started coming out in German, I started to question whether I was in the right place at the right time. They were usually followed in English so why should I have been concerned? On flying into Vienna and being an hour and a half late, I wondered what had happened to Deb and Josh who were supposed to meet me in baggage claim. How was I going to get hold of them if they were not there? Was I going to be able to get the information of where we were staying off of my computer? Was there wifi at the airport to access my gmail account? Of course, I had not printed a hard copy out of where we were staying.

To make a long story short, I got my bag and walked out of baggage claim into the terminal. There, Deb and Josh were waiting for me. My stress was over and our adventure could begin.

Investments in Iran endanger troops

I get to do a little self-promotion. I had an Op-Ed piece printed in the Sioux Falls Argus Leader today. The Op-Ed is very similar to an earlier post on this blog. The piece is timely as the bill, Senate Bill 134, was taken up by the South Dakota Senate State Affairs Committee yesterday. The committee gave it a unanimous "Do Pass." Thank you to all of the senators on the committee. To read my Op-Ed, just click on the link below:

http://www.argusleader.com/article/20100218/VOICES05/2180314

A Topsy Turvy World

Several months ago, in the hopes of renewing Israel –Palestinian peace negotiations, the United States demanded that Israel halt all construction in areas outside of its pre-1967 boundaries. I find this unilateral demand amazing.

We demand that an ally, Israel, with a democratically elected government with a fragile coalition take actions that we know are against the principles of its coalition. On the Palestinian side ruled by a dictatorship, we demand nothing because we are afraid it will hurt the popularity of the leader and therefore the government. Doesn’t something seem wrong here? You demand unilateral action by a government that is popularly elected that goes against its stated self-interest. You refuse to demand anything of a government that maintains its position by the gun.

Our thinking is topsy-turvy. Our policy is just backwards. One government does everything by fiat but cannot do anything is this regard because it might be unpopular. The other who rules democratically is demanded to do something that we know is unpopular. I just don’t get it.

Our Duty

On their own, new technologies do not take sides in the struggle for freedom and progress, but the United States does. We stand for a single internet where all of humanity has equal access to knowledge and ideas. And we recognize that the world’s information infrastructure will become what we and others make of it. Now, this challenge may be new, but our responsibility to help ensure the free exchange of ideas goes back to the birth of our republic.

Secretary of State Hilary Rodham Clinton

January 21, 2010

Some of these challenges are very useful, particularly for the new generation, in whom the essential fervor of the Green Movement (Mr. Mousavi’s Political Movement in Iran) is found. The true achievement of the Islamic Revolution is the struggle against a return to dictatorship and the resistance of the people on this path. The refusal to conform to lies, cheating and corruption, which we witness today (in Iran), clearly shows the presence of this ongoing and everlasting achievement, just as the tightening choke hold on the media and press, the filling up of prisons and the merciless killings of the innocents on the streets, whose only wish is to peacefully obtain what is rightfully theirs; clearly shows the existence of the roots of oppression and dictatorship which are leftovers of the tyrannical monarchy.

Mir-Hossein Moussavi

February 2, 2010

To me, the issues are clear cut. Our Secretary of State says in eloquent terms that access to the internet is a human right. Mr. Moussavi describes the situation in Iran as one in which the ugly head of dictatorship is raising its head.

Today is the 31^st anniversary of the Iranian Revolution and the ousting of the shah. For anyone who is interested, we watch the attempts of thousands of brave men and women trying to stand up to this dictatorship. For the past six months, we saw the people of Iran demand that their votes in the last presidential election be counted. As with the demonstrations today, these people face tear gas and beatings and being shot. They are rounded up and thrown in jail. Some are tortured and some are murdered. When they are rounded up, their families are not told.

What can America do to help? Are we still the great bastion of Democracy or not? Do we have the power to help these people? I think we can help without sending our troops which would have the wrong affect. In the name of promoting the Democracy that we hold dear, we should find a way to open the internet to the people of Iran. The Iranian people need an internet that is not censored by the Iranian government. Do we not have the technology to get something similar to wifi for the Iranian people? How does Google provide free internet in Mountain View? Madame Clinton speaks of an uncensored internet as a basic freedom. We must insure that these freedom seeking people have access to sending and receiving information.

If this revolution succeeds, will the new Iranian government be pro-American? I wish I could answer that positively but I cannot. If we are seen as an ally helping Iranians claim their freedom, we have a good chance. But whatever the outcome may be, a new government can hardly be worse either for us or the Iranian people than what they have now. As Americans, we have a duty to help people seeking freedom. Most Americans believe this. I hope our government does as well.

DragNet

First, as an aside, the title is not original to me. I saw this in the first article and loved it. Second and much more importantly, if you are concerned about internet privacy and protection of your First Amendment Rights, I suggest you take a little time and read both articles. As I have discussed with many people, I am very concerned about what information the government has on me. I am not worried that I am breaking the law today but what happens if the laws change. If the government has access to everything that I have written or looked at, something lawful when I did it may not be lawful in the future. You may think that I am paranoid, and maybe I am, but I know of incidences in other countries where that is exactly what happened. I hope that you will take time to read the articles and forward them to others who might be concerned as well. Of course, as I have said before, if you are reading my blog you are probably already in trouble.

Police want backdoor to Web users' private data – Cnet News

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10446503-38.html

Google to enlist NSA to help it ward off cyberattacks – Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/03/AR2010020304057_pf.html

Is this the Future of Computing?

I think that like many people, I am fascinated by new technology. Without it, I would not be in the printing business. Desktop publishing and simple accounting allowed me to be in business these past 22 years. Likewise, technology may be the destructor of this business with more internet use and less paper. Well, I will stop crying in my beer.

This morning, I came across 2 interesting articles in the Gadget Lab at Wired.com. While each one is interesting in its own right, taken together they are mind blowing.

Not that the order to read them is important but I have listed them in the order that I read them. The first one is about a Portuguese company that is developing a film that turns anything into a touch screen. The second is about the new iPad. I did not think of the iPad as being revolutionary but after reading this article, I am having second thoughts. If the iPad could eventually be made so thin by using the film in the first article, people might be able to carry around a huge computer in their pocket. I realize that we are along way from there but to me the potential is fantastic.

I hope that you enjoy the 2 articles. They are not too long. You might find that you spend more time just thinking about the possibilities and the future of computing.

Thin Film Turns Any Surface Into a Touchscreen

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/02/thin-film-touchscreen/#ixzz0eOOx1nQc

What the iPad Means for the Future of Computing

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/#ixzz0eORKrOld