Category: Jewish identity

Solidarity saved me from the Nazis; that’s why I fight Israeli apartheid

“Never again for humankind” means supporting Palestinian resistance to Israel’s Prawer Plan.

26 November 2013 – We hear disturbing reports this year from southern Israel. The Israeli government proposes to relocate some 70,000 Palestinian Bedouins from their present homes to government-approved townships. This is called the Prawer Plan, and Israel’s parliament approved it by a three-vote majority in June.

The Prawer Plan would destroy 35 Bedouin villages in the Naqab (Negev) region and extinguish Bedouin claims to land seized from them after the foundation of Israel. The government denies basic services to these villages. Right beside them, in many cases, are new, modern, fully serviced communities for Jewish settlers. Continue reading Solidarity saved me from the Nazis; that’s why I fight Israeli apartheid

On the Holocaust memorial day why I support Palestinian rights

In Canada, Holocaust Memorial Day has been established by Heritage Canada to be on April 11. It is a good opportunity to review what we learn from the Holocaust experience and how we apply these lessons to the troubled situation in the Middle East.

This year, students in more than 60 cities took part in educational meetings on conditions in Palestine as part of Israeli Apartheid Week, held March 1–7.

It is a controversial event, not popular in Canadian government circles.

It is criticized for supposedly dishonouring the victims of Hitler’s holocaust.

I am a survivor of the Jewish Holocaust, the Nazis’ mass murder of Europe’s Jews.

The tragic experience of my family and community under Hitler makes me alert to the suffering of other peoples denied their human rights today – including the Palestinians. Continue reading On the Holocaust memorial day why I support Palestinian rights

Israel’s apartheid: Making Palestinians pay for Hitler’s crimes

This speech was given on March 2, 2010, to a meeting of students at the University of Waterloo in Canada, held as part of the Israeli Apartheid Week. She, a holocaust survivor, is a member of Not in Our Name: Jewish Voices Against Zionism and of the Coalition Against Israeli Apartheid in Toronto.

A year after a murderous Israel’s assault, the war on the people of Gaza continues. Gaza is still under siege – still surrounded by walls and checkpoints. Its people are denied the necessities of life and the right to rebuild and shape their future.

For me, as a survivor of the holocaust, the tragic situation in Gaza awakens memories of what I and my family experienced under Hitlerism – the ghetto walls, the killings, the systematic starvation and deprivation, the daily humiliations. Continue reading Israel’s apartheid: Making Palestinians pay for Hitler’s crimes

How To Really Fight Anti-Semitism

This article is adapted from a talk given to 90 participants in a “train the trainers workshop” organized by Palestine Freedom of Expression on August 26.

We often hear the charge that taking a firm stand for Palestinian rights is somehow anti-Semitic. What is anti-Semitism? Here are some common definitions:

  • “Belief or behavior hostile toward Jews just because they are Jewish.” (Anti-Defamation League)
  • “Anti-Jewish racism,” which emphasizes the “innate hostility of Jews to the interests of non-Jews.” (Political Dictionary)
  • “Hostility toward or discrimination against Jews as a religious group or ‘race.’” (Britannica Concise Encyclopedia)

Continue reading How To Really Fight Anti-Semitism

The Siege of Gaza: Israel Uses Hitler’s Methods Against Palestinians

The following is the text of a talk to a joint meeting of Muslim and Jewish supporters of Palestinian rights at the Taric Islamic Centre in Toronto, on June 14, 2008.

[This article is also available in Spanish. See Rebelión, August 17, 2008]

This inspiring meeting seeks to reach out to Jewish and Muslim communities, to build understanding of the conflict in the Middle East. Thank you for the honour of inviting me to participate.

My life has been shaped by the Jewish Holocaust under Hitler. My mother died in Auschwitz, and I barely escaped the same fate. Like many others, I have sought to resist the forces of war and oppression that we saw in Nazism and that still live on. We have won victories, such as the destruction of apartheid in South Africa. Continue reading The Siege of Gaza: Israel Uses Hitler’s Methods Against Palestinians

Two Ghettos: Warsaw and Gaza

Given to a public meeting initiating our organization, Not in Our Name (NION), Jew Opposing Zionism. Israel’s treatment of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip was viewed in contrast to the Nazis’ creation of the Warsaw ghetto.

Let’s begin in Warsaw

On October 16, 1940,  the authorities in Warsaw in Nazi-occupied Poland, ordered the city’s 440,000 Jews to leave their homes and move into a tiny area, the Jewish ghetto. Four weeks later, the Nazi sealed off the Ghetto with a 10-foot wall.

Food rations in the Ghetto were a small fraction of the minimum for survival. The inhabitants improvised smuggling food in the Ghetto. Still, by 1942, more than 100,000 in the Ghetto had died of starvation and disease. Continue reading Two Ghettos: Warsaw and Gaza

The Holocaust and Defense of the Palestinians

Forces responsible for slaughter of Jews now oppress the Palestinian people

This article is based on a talk given to a meeting of Muslim Unity of Toronto on December 23, 2006.

Sixty years ago, a mass slaughter – a holocaust – was carried out against European Jews. Today its memory is being misused to build support for Zionism and to oppress and murder the Palestinians.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper says that Canada must not talk with Hezbollah or Hamas, organizations that defend the Palestinians, because they “advocate wiping Israel off the face of the Earth” — an objective that he says is “ultimately genocidal,” that is, another holocaust. (Globe & Mail, Dec. 21, 2006) He uses this excuse to justify punishing Palestinians for electing Hamas by cutting off aid to their government. Continue reading The Holocaust and Defense of the Palestinians

Anti-Jewish Prejudice Yesterday and Today

Editors’ note: “Anti-Semitism” is a much misused and much misunderstood concept. This epithet is often wrongly applied to opposition to the Israeli state’s apartheid-like policies—such as the statement in defense of Palestinians adopted by the Canadian Union of Public Employees’ Ontario convention in May. Yet anti-Jewish prejudice remains deeply rooted in capitalist society and continues to pose a deadly threat to all working people. Suzanne Weiss explained its origins and present character in a talk given to the Socialism 2006 conference, organized by Socialist Action in Toronto, on April 29, 2006. This article is based on that talk.

In 1919, V.I. Lenin, the great leader of the Russian Revolution, gave a brief talk on anti-Semitism that was recorded for use among the Russian peasantry. Continue reading Anti-Jewish Prejudice Yesterday and Today