Seattle Synagogue Hosts Israel Critic Who Was Condemned by Wiesenthal Center.
TEMPLE DE HIRSCH HOSTS ACTIVIST WHO COMPARES ISRAEL TO JIM CROW SOUTH
HILLEL UW-JCONNECT PROMOTES “INTIMATE CONVERSATION” WITH CONTROVERSIAL ISRAEL CRITIC AND “YOUNG ADULTS”
The relentless efforts of groups like New Israel Fund and J Street to dilute Jewish support for Israel in Seattle is bearing fruit. Case in point is the upcoming lecture by Israel critic Matthew Duss. The event sponsored by J Street and New Israel Fund will be hosted by Temple De Hirsch Sinai, a once reliable bastion of support for the Jewish state.
Duss along with his colleagues at the Center for American Progress have made comments so extreme that they have earned opprobrium of the Obama White House and censure from the Simon Wiesenthal Center. Duss has referred to Israel’s defensive arms blockade on Hamas ruled Gaza as a “moral abomination” and compared the Jewish State’s policies to those of the Jim Crow South. According to the Jerusalem Post; the Wiesenthal center condemned the statements of Duss and his colleagues, describing their comments as “infected with Jew-hatred and discriminatory policy positions toward Israel.”
Hillel UW’s JConnect is promoting an “intimate conversation” with Duss immediately following the Temple De Hirsch event. The coffee & dessert reception with the outspoken Israel critic is being targeted towards Seattle’s Jewish young adults. Nowhere in the promotional materials for the Hillel UW-JConnect event are potential attendees informed of Duss’s caustic positions on the Jewish state. JConnect’s programming is funded in part by the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle. The contact person for this event is Elana Fruchtman, Hillel UW’s JConnect Director.
Even among Israel’s Jewish critics, few have been as vocal as Duss in their anathema for the Israeli Prime Minister. Last October Duss was quoted in the Huffington Post decrying Benjamin Netanyahu as “an enemy of the progressive agenda… re-elected on the back of blatant anti-Arab race-baiting”. Duss’s animus towards Netanyahu is so intense that he condemned American liberal organizations for even speaking with the Prime Minister.
Pressing for a more Israel-critical platform, Duss told the Democratic Party Platform Committee that Israel’s policies “run contrary to fundamental Amererican values”. Duss will be speaking at Temple De Hirsch Sinai Congregation on August 24th.
Duss is currently the President of the Foundation for Middle East Peace, an organization that according to NGO Monitor presents “an entirely distorted view of the Arab-Israeli conflict based solely on the Palestinian narrative of victimization and Israeli aggression.”
Some in the Seattle Jewish community expressed disappointment at Seattle’s flagship reform congregation hosting such a divisive personality. Said Ari Hoffman, a local community leader; “It wasn’t so long ago that Rabbi Wiener and Rabbi Meyer of Temple De Hirsch condemned the local screening of a pro-Israel film for fear that it would undermine a communal “sense of mutual respect and tolerance”. For a synagogue so concerned about “mutual respect” I find it ironic that they are hosting a speaker who spews Israel demonizing propaganda. It is hurtful to many Jews here in the Pacific Northwest and frankly makes me sad.”
Matt Duss will be speaking at Temple De Hirsch (Seattle) on Wed. Aug. 24th at 7pm.
Update 08/22/2016: With a hastily penned email, New Israel Fund, one of the organizers of the Matt Duss event, notified registrants that the controversial lecture would no longer be held at Temple De Hirsch as originally planned. Per the New Israel Fund, the featured speaker Matt Duss will now offer his criticisms of the Jewish State at the Kavana Cooperative/Queen Anne Christian Church in Seattle. No explanation was offered for the last minute change in venue.
Update 08/23/2016: J Street confirms that the Matt Duss event will now be held at Queen Anne Christian Church and hosted by the Kavana Cooperative.
It figures New Israel Fund is one of the organizers of the Matt Duss event.
Here’s a great article about New Israel Fund.
http://www.jewishpress.com/indepth/opinions/hamoked-a-new-israel-fund-grantee-defending-those-who-celebrate-israeli-deaths/2016/02/21/
HaMoked: A New Israel Fund Grantee Defending Those who Celebrate Israeli Deaths
By: Ronn Torossian
Published: February 21st, 2016
Matthew Duss retweeted a tweet. Why every Black activist should stand with Palestinian Rasmea Odeh. Odeh is a Palestinian terrorist who murdered 2 Israeli teenagers in a supermarket in 1969.
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Copies of this Mike Report should be distributed to each attendee that evening along with pointed questions to ask at end of the speech and home research to be done to find his fallacies and true affiliation and sources of money
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