About Change

How many years does it take to change from the patriarchal societies of biblical times to gender equality in the modern age? 

The short answer is thousands of years.  Exactly why it is not clear, but in many societies today women are still considered second class citizens.  They are not allowed to vote or to drive.  In some places girls get killed if they attend school!

Here in the US we women have been voting for one hundred years.  We came a long way, but in some progressive companies there is still a gap in pay between men and women.  As shown in 60 minutes of April 15 the CEO of Sales Force was not aware of the gender gap in his own company. When it was pointed out to him he had to spend 3 million dollars in the first year that he implemented true gender equality.  

I have been a true liberal since I was a girl. These days my main challenge to liberals is how come they are so accepting and tolerant with gender bias among Muslims?  Is tolerance more important than equal rights for women?

Why are we all so afraid to criticize Muslim practices?

Why is it so impolite to upset the Muslims?

We are talking about equality for women!!!!  Women are half the population of the world!  We know for a hundred years that genetically their minds and intelligence are equal to men.  We are still fighting for it here.  But in the Muslim world we shrug our shoulders: It is their culture. It is their problem....  Change takes a long time so it will take them a long time...

I am happy to tell you that I found an ally among Muslims!  I met her at the gala of the Museum of Tolerance.  Soraya Deen: an advocate for women's rights in Islam.  I saw this tall lady standing there wearing a beautiful golden sari.  I was immediately drawn to talk to her and we exchanged phone numbers.

Soraya Deen with her friend Raheel Raza.

Raheel Raza received the Museum of Tolerance Award that evening at the Gala.

Raheel Raza is President of The Council for Muslims Facing Tomorrow, founding member of The Muslim Reform Movement, Director of Forum for Learning, award winning journalist, public speaker, advocate for human rights, gender equality and dignity in diversity. 

Soraya Deen was active in opening Northern California's first female-led mosque in Berkeley. In April 2017. This is a place where women can participate and feel empowered. 

She has written an op-Ed article in sister-hood, an award winning digital magazine spotlighting the diverse voices of women of Muslim heritage. The title of her article: "Are Women Welcome at Paris Mosque?"

Here is an introduction written about Soraya in the sister-hood magazine:

Soraya Deen is the founder of the Muslim Women Speakers Movement, and Co-founder of Peacemoms (Promoting Christian Muslim Dialogue.) She is a professional speaker, spiritual activist, lawyer, Educator and Author.  Soraya was the first Katheeba at the inaugural prayer of Qalbu Women’s Mosque in Berkeley.

I met Soraya again on a Sunday morning in Van Nuys and we have agreed to join our voices.  Here are some of her questions to me that I am often asked:

1.    Do women enjoy equality with men in Judaism?

I have multiple answers to this question: 

Everyone needs to consider these simple numbers:

Muslim population of the world is one point eight billion that is 18 plus 8 zeros.

Jewish population of the world is fourteen million that is 14 plus 6 zeros. 

The number of Muslims is over a 100 times larger than the number of Jews.  This difference should be considered every time you try to make this comparison.

My second answer is that change comes much faster in Judaism.  Just some examples: Polygamy was outlawed by rabbis back in the 11^th century.  In main stream Islam men are still allowed to marry four women.  And many Muslims are importing this practice to Western countries.  All this information is available in the palm of your hand.  

An additional answer: Jews have many forms of observance available to them: orthodox, conservative, reform.  They have choices.  I believe the extreme practices limiting women’s freedom do exist, but they are less rampant.

2.   After hearing that I was born in Iran and moved to Israel when I was 4 years old, Soraya asked me: "Why did your parents leave Iran?"

My answer to this question starts with the Jews of Mashhad as I wrote "about me" in my blog:

The Jews of Mashhad were forced to practice Islam for one hundred and fifty years. They kept their Judaic traditions in hiding.  My parents were married in Mashhad then moved to Tehran where I was born.  In 1951 the entire family immigrated to Israel. The Mashadi community kept their specific traditions for decades throughout the world: Israel, New York, London, and Milan.

When the state of Israel was created it was everyone’s dream to live where they are free to practice their Judaism.

Soraya knew about stories like this, but she said hearing it from me made the stories more real and vivid.

I told her about my aunts and uncles given Muslim names: Soraya, Moussa, and Dawood.

She asked me if there was persecution, but I thought it was mainly intolerance. 

I asked her if she heard about the pogroms against Jews, she said she never heard the word.  The pogroms who drove many Jews to wonder around and seek better lives are not known to many Muslims.  But Soraya complained that in the mosques they are always taught to hate Jews, to the point where she is tired of it.  She talked about "men with beards" who keep telling women what to do, but she is on a mission to empower women to follow their own wishes and desires.

In a small way I am hoping to bring a change in equality for women around the world.  Maybe the day will come that all men and women will work hand in hand for a better world.

Vedem – In the Lead

I attended a very touching ceremony for the commemoration of the holocaust at the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles.  There were a number of holocaust survivors including my dear friend Gitta Rosenzweig, a hidden child of the holocaust.

There were also many dignitaries, councils from a number of European countries, rabbis, and a children choir.  They spoke about the Butterfly Project: A living memorial to honor the 1.5 million children who perished in the Holocaust.  People getting together to paint as many ceramic butterflies as the number of kids killed in the Holocaust.

Vedem-the magazine from the concentration camp Terezin:

The most exciting part of the ceremony was the opening of the exhibition named Vedem.  Vedem (In the Lead) is Czech-language literary magazine that existed from 1942 to 1944 in the Terezin concentration camp, during the Holocaust. It was hand-produced by a group of boys living in the Home One barracks, led by Editor-in-chief Petr Ginz. Altogether, some 700 pages of Vedem survived World War II.  Some of these pages are displayed in this very touching exhibition.

Vedem-The creativity of children in danger:

A drawing by Petr Ginz of the planet Earth as seen from the Moon was taken by Israeli astronaut Ilan Ramon onto Space Shuttle Columbia, which disintegrated upon its reentry into the earth’s atmosphere.

Moon Landscape: Memory of the Holocaust into space:

 At 16, Ginz was deported to Auschwitz, where he was gassed.

This exhibition is demonstrating the power of imagination and creativity of human beings under the most distressing conditions.  What a waste of the human potential...

Political Balance in a Democracy

We hear about the phenomenon of Donald Trump having such an unstoppable run to become a Republican candidate for president of the United States. Two of my good intelligent friends told me they will vote for him as they are staunch republicans. It is the kind of people who say anything is better than Hillary, or Obama was the worst thing that happened in the USA.   

One of these friends told me: "Sara, there is no justice there never was and there never will be justice." This may be true but it does not stop me from striving for justice, truth, knowledge. 

We are all proud to be part of the American democracy. How do we improve it?  I want to present some of my ideas of finding balance in our divided politics. 

People will tell you that capitalism is the reason for the economic success of this country. I can show you here where pure capitalism fails. By pure capitalism I mean judging every move by the immediate monetary returns. What is lacking in this policy is a long term vision of the economy and welfare of the citizens. Here are a few examples of where we can improve. 

Nutrition: We have large successful food companies that provide us with fully stacked supermarket shelves. There is no lack of food or malnutrition like in many other places in the world. The downside is that in order to maximize shelf life and so profits the packaged food is loaded with sugar, fat and salt. No one suspected that there is anything wrong with this. No one thought that we are losing balance here. There is over nutrition that our physiology is not equipped with defense mechanisms against it. So we have to deal with epidemic levels of high blood pressure, obesity, cancer. To find balance the food industries should have a minimum degree of social responsibility

Education: I am so lucky to have gotten my education for free back in 1960’s Israel!  Today in the US most people need to get college loans to complete their education and they are burdened with heavy debts when they start their career.  I am even hearing this idea that we do not have enough teachers and universities to give a college education to all.  This idea is completely out of balance.  We can put more people to work building more universities!  There is nothing as important and essential as passing knowledge to future generations.  Again: we need a long term policy!  In addition we now have the internet with an ever growing number of educational websites for every learning disability imaginable.  There is no reason whatsoever that anyone who wants to learn cannot learn!

Clean water and air:  For a balanced political policy clean air and water are essential.  The people who claim it is too expensive to switch from oil to solar energy have no long term vision.  There is abundance of water in the world.  We need all the bright brains to have the knowledge to develop better ways to deliver clean water to as many people as possible.

Health care: A viable democracy requires a healthy knowledgeable electorate.  I had many arguments with those who oppose affordable health care for all.  The last of their points was that we do not have enough doctors and hospitals to care for everyone.  Again there is no long term vision here.  Why did we get to this place?  Why can't we train more doctors?  Why can’t we put people to work building more hospitals? 

I believe in balance between conservative and liberal ideas, tradition and progress.  But if we have an uneducated poor electorate with no affordable health care, why are we surprised that Donald Trump is so ahead in the polls?  We now have citizens with limited education and questionable health overwhelmingly voting for Donald Trump. I wonder if they learned in school about the rise of Hitler. 

Paris ISIS and Petrodollars

Today I don't have any message.  I have mainly confusion and will try to pass along the fog surrounding me.

I am not an expert on political commentary or history or economics.  I only have some experience in the basic science of biochemistry and protein chemistry.
I try to keep up with current events by following different sources.  Radio, TV, international news.  It is ever more confusing to understand what the truth is especially after the Paris attacks of November 13.
Who is Isis?  How did it it begin?  Whose fault is it?  Who is funding it?  What is the best way to fight it?  You will hear as many opinions as there are commentators.  And all commentaries come with some bias: political right or left.  Religious orthodox or secular.   Emotionally the hard and the soft.
I like to follow an Israeli radio program that reviews the world newspapers.  This week most front page articles were about the Paris attacks.  Yitshak Noy, certainly with his own bias mentioned an exceptional article in the New York Times by an Algerian writer. 

Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/21/opinion/saudi-arabia-an-isis-that-has-made-it.html?_r=0

Kamel Daoud

This article is exceptional as it talks "On the Religious Industrial Complex of Saudi Arabia", a sensitive topic in an oil dependent world.  In the newspaper that usually holds left wing opinions.

Here is an excerpt:

"It is worth reading certain Islamist newspapers to see their reactions to the attacks in Paris. The West is cast as a land of “infidels.” The attacks were the result of the onslaught against Islam. Muslims and Arabs have become the enemies of the secular and the Jews. The Palestinian question is invoked along with the rape of Iraq and the memory of colonial trauma, and packaged into a messianic discourse meant to seduce the masses. Such talk spreads in the social spaces below, while up above, political leaders send their condolences to France and denounce a crime against humanity. This totally schizophrenic situation parallels the West’s denial regarding Saudi Arabia."

I see this article as pointing out a reality in the Arab world.  I have read many of Ayaan Hirsi Ali's writings.  I have been following this Somali woman who grew up Muslim.  She is considered an infidel and Muslims are threatening her since they murdered the Dutch director Theo Van Goch.  She insists that Islam must have a reformation and specifically the problem of "preaching teachers."  

 

Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Another opinion published in the same newspaper by Thomas L. Friedman is showing a softer point of view:

 

Cabs, Camels or ISIS

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/18/opinion/cabs-camels-or-isis.html

 

Thomas Friedman

In this article we hear about positive innovations in the Arab world and the need to strengthen good non ISIS Sunnis.  But he ends the article so:

"Turkey cares more about defeating Kurds; Saudi Arabia and its Arab Gulf allies care more about defeating Iran and its proxies in Iraq, Yemen and Syria; Qatar cares more about promoting the Muslim Brotherhood in Syria and annoying Saudi Arabia; Iran cares more about protecting Shiites in Iraq and Syria than creating a space for decent Sunnis to thrive; and many of the non-ISIS Sunni activists in Syria and Iraq are still Islamists — and they’re not going away. How do you weave a decent carpet from these threads?

I don’t know — and until I do I’d be cautious about going far beyond what we’re already doing. Paris may be totally different today. The Middle East is not."

Each of us can read these articles and figure out what should we do next.  Many people agree with me that we should insist on sustainable sources of energy.  Heard from a friend how to take personal action:

http://www.fuelfreedom.org/

-started by successful Israel entrepreneurs to fight the energy establishment that steers the US policies to support the Saudi Kingdom.

And we should remember to be thankful.

 

Separation of Church and State

These days people often say the world is going mad!  With all the wars political debates and endless disagreements I often had this idea:  At times like this we need better leaders!  We need some spiritual guidance of what is right and wrong in this world.  We need inspiration.  It cannot be always about money and power!
Coming from science I'd like to bring a simple illustration of the Bell Curve.  This is the universal statistics of how all options spread.

Now let's us talk about intelligence.  The IQ test examines the intelligence of people.  The results are defined such that IQ of 100 is the average.  If you check the bell curve in the graph below, you can see that most people have an IQ between 85 and 115.  The smartest are the 2% on the right side, and the most unintelligent are the 2% on the left.
 

 

In the simplest terms this means that half the people are smarter than the rest.  The other half are not as smart.  So in general the smarter people have a better chance to succeed in life, get a degree, accumulate wealth and so on.  The other half naturally will not have the same chances.  They maybe trash collectors or menial laborers.
For a rational mind it is obvious that the fortunate smarter people have an inherent responsibility to look after the less fortunate ones.  This idea of the greater good is very basic.  We all benefit when others do well. 

All this rational reasoning hardly works in the world of politics today.  Rich powerful people get richer and control politicians.  In the US we have Citizens United which allows corporations to donate unlimited amounts of money to political campaigns.  The oil rich Arab countries keep funding Muslim organizations around the world.  The largest refugee crisis in the world brings a stream of refugees to the shores of Europe every day.  And there is no end in sight.
We believe in the principle of separation of Church and State, so no one expects any religious leader to rise and preach for goodness.  I kept wondering when will such a leader show up?
And then Pope Francis came to visit and gave a speech to congress.  He said what needs to be said: We should respect each other’s traditions.  We should remember the Golden Rule.  Most important: we should protect the sick and the weak.  Homelessness is our communal failure.  We should protect our earth, our common home.  

I wonder how well we can keep this idea of separating religion from politics.  We can all doubt the existence of God (what god?Jesus?  Allah?)  We can all doubt the legends and superstitions attached to the various religions.  But as history unfolds we can see various leaders arise to guide the human connection: Sometimes it is a military commander, sometimes a philosopher or the Dalai Lama.  This time is it a catholic Pope?

Jimmy's Hall, Art, Culture and Religion

This is the story of a wonderful movie I just watched at Laemmle Cinemas: "Jimmy's Hall."  This movie is based on a true story from Ireland in the thirties.  I am telling this story to show one small example of what the ruling class and the church could do in order to stay in power.  Is there any justice or compassion in this story?

These are highlights of the true story: In 1933, Jimmy Gralton, as he was known locally, became the only Irish citizen ever to have been deported from the country when he was forcefully removed and put on a boat to America. He would never set foot in his native land again.

Such severe punishment for his ‘crimes’ seems improbable 81 years on. A dissident voice, Gralton was victimized by the political and religious establishment after daring to establish a dance hall in rural Ireland. A self-educated, community-serving man, Gralton’s hall was built to serve as a venue for the local people of Leitrim.

The youth in the village begging Jimmy to reopen his Hall.

Community dances, singing lessons, poetry appreciation sessions, boxing classes, and debates about workers’ rights were held there. It sounds innocuous. But for the Catholic Church and the Irish ruling class, the hall and the man who built it represented something dangerous and subversive — the fact that the people were beginning to think and act for themselves.

Jimmy and the orchestra

The movie clearly visualizes the story: The church continuously sabotaged Jimmy’s group.  Jimmy’s Hall was burned twice.  When the police came to deport him, his lovely old mother said: “What did I do?  I just gave him books!?”  The lady was running a mobile library.
I think all religions are guilty of ruling societies based on ignorance.  They are stuck in the ideas of tradition and orthodoxy.
I see no other way but for all religions to modernize.  We need to accept the fact that people should be educated.  That knowledge is accessible to all.  That women are equal to men.
Jimmy was talking about jazz and dancing with black people in NY.  "They actually have two legs!!"  I advocate separation of state and religion in Israel.  Although I know that the religious establishment has control over many of the personal laws.  This is despite the fact that 60% of the citizens would like the freedom in making their choices.
The Catholics have the most change to go through.  I know I am very naïve, but there needs to be an end celibacy for priests.  I read that the whole practice came about because they didn't want any land belonging to the church to be divided among the heirs.  This was pointed out clearly in Dan Brown's best seller The Da Vinci Code.
I cannot say how Islam is going to adapt to these modern times of every kid holding a cell phone with knowledge and information right at the tip of their fingers.  But I truly wish to see more justice and equality. 

I’d like to hear more voices like Jimmy’s for progressive politics.  For allowing people to use their creativity and imagination to paint and sing and dance.

Jimmy Gralton represented that alternative voice and finding a space for dissidents — and also seeing them as important alternative arguments — is a major question of our time.

Balance of Freedom and Obedience

We all wish for freedom in some way. When growing up we need freedoms but some discipline is required.  Women flourish when given freedom to pursue their dreams and goals, yet in many cultures they are still forced to submission.  Free societies have more freedoms for their citizens to achieve their dreams and goals, compared with authoritative governments that insist on keeping centralized power and no freedom to the “small people.”

Children like to run around free, explore and imagine. Yet many parents think it important to discipline them: Sit straight!  Don’t speak with food in your mouth!  I find that kids become better adults when they are exposed to many experiences and are given the choices to do the things that ignite their imagination.  The balance of this is to teach some “manners”.  Basically kids need to learn to appreciate other kids and never fear that they would be discriminated against.

Women don’t have any basic rights in so many places in the world.  Even in the Western democracies women had to fight for their right to vote and it took a long process to grant them this right.  Equality is a right that we have to fight for continuously.  I’d like to bring here two extreme examples for women’s equality: Sharol Sandberg, one of the most successful women in social media: married, pregnant.  Sadly she lost her husband.  This is a woman at her best: Shining, active, a role model for many young girls.

Then you can look at this photo of young girls being sold as slaves by ISIS.

In 2015 some men believe that going back to the days of the caliphate is an ideal to strive for.  There are also many other women with no rights and no freedoms: women in India born into “generational prostitution,” and other examples you can watch in the documentary “Half the Sky.”

I believe we would all be better off if young girls would get a similar education to men everywhere.  If they were allowed basic freedoms and given their own choices they would be able to contribute so much more to our lives.  They would be raising the next generation of children the same way: freely encouraging imagination and creativity.

Freedom comes with responsibility. Freedom cannot be guaranteed if people do as they please without considering the consequences.  I will try and address this in a future post.

Balance of Power and Ideas

We always hear about the power balance between the two super powers US and Russia.  In the future China maybe one of the superpowers. Each superpower needs to keep as many allies and areas of influence as it can.  Who is first at the arms race?  Who is best at space exploration?  It is a fine balance.
These superpowers have their blocks of supporters in the United Nations.  Many of our world's conflicts are fought over in this organization.  One of the conflicts we hear about most is the Israeli Arab conflict.
To try and understand this conflict I have started with the Jewish history highlights.  (one of my earlier posts.)  The Jews call this country their home as they have no other home.
Let's check the balance here:  There are 20 million Jews in the world.  The number of Muslims is close to a billion.  That is a thousand million!  The number of Muslims keep growing.  Out of these 400 million are Arabs.
This map shows the areas where Arabs and Jews live:




The Jews represent the idea of one god but they also have the story of exile and persecution.  This idea of one god was further evolved by Christianity and Islam.  There were many cases where Jews were converted to Christians or to Muslims.
Jews like those in my family who migrated to Mashhad refused to convert.  For them being Jewish in unchangeable.
The balance of these two ideas is that the Muslim world is unable to accept an independent Jewish state.  The conflict is going on for 67 years and there are still refugees from the 1948 war.
There are certainly Israeli Jews that are extremely radical.  They settle in the west bank and the government supports them despite Israelis public opinion.  But have a look if these Jewish radicals are in any balance with Muslim radicals around the world.  There are certainly friendly Arab nations and enlightened Muslims.  But all I hear is constant bashing of Israel.  Demonizing Israel to the point of sanctions and boycott of Israeli academic institutions.
And there is Iran with its own history of glory and defeat.  Iran is the country where my family came from.  These people who are considerate and polite, people who speak Farsi and love it.  Iran joins this Israel bashing full force.  "Death to Israel" is declared in every speech and written on signs in every mosque.  One US senator came up with the point that Iran should recognize Israel as a Jewish state in order to end the sanctions against it.  This simple point is considered a "poison pill."  My question is why?  Why is it so impossible for them to accept a small state representing such a small part of the earth's population?
When are we going to reach a balance here?

Mohammad from Israel

A young law professor came to talk at the UCLA Nazarian center Feb 11, 2015

Jewish and Democratic?: A Perspective from Israel's Arab Minority

Professor Mohammed S. Wattad

Bright and clever, he has an impressive law career.

He started his talk by telling us about a conference he attended in Canada where he presented himself to a Canadian judge: "I am Mohammad from Israel."  The judge asked "How come?"  This comment made him think deeply about his identity and having to explain that he is an Israeli Arab.  He does not feel as a Palestinian but as an Arab.

He talked as a lawyer from a legal point of view and tried to keep religion out of his discussion. He described the partition plan by the British, which he read very carefully:

“Two states to two people: One state Jewish with an Arab minority, a second state Arab with a Jewish minority.  BOTH PALESTINIANS.”  Ben Gurion accepted the plan, but the Arabs rejected it.

He pointed out that Israel has no constitution; therefore it is wrong for anyone to claim that it is a constitutional democracy.  He talked about Israel's series of basic laws jokingly saying that Jews have a hard time agreeing on anything, so that is why there was never a constitution.

One of the basic laws from 1992 deals with human dignity, liberty and the right to life.

(If I understand correctly there are no laws dealing with freedom of speech or social and economic rights.)

The main body that keeps law and justice in Israel is the 15 member Supreme Court, the only body that protects human rights and democracy.  It is the Supreme Court that established the democratic facets of the state.  He brought examples of the Supreme Court decisions.

He talked about Israeli Arabs not serving in the army. But the issue is that soldiers who do serve are discriminated to be the only ones protecting the security of Israelis, including orthodox Jews and Arabs who do not serve.  One of the solutions was that those who do not serve in the army would serve in another kind of National service.

Mohammad made a very clever point saying that in that case every Israeli should have a choice how to serve.  This is very clever again.  Legally it makes sense.  But practically this is a trap for IDF.  The power of IDF is that EVERY ISRAELI is a soldier. It is the strength of the whole, the strength of the spirit.

People asked him about the impossibility of a separate Palestinian state and mentioned that withdrawals from Lebanon and Gaza brought in Hezbollah and Hamas.  His answer was that Israel was the one who created Hamas as opposition to PLO.  In addition he claimed that a unilateral withdrawal is not the same as a negotiated withdrawal.

My question to Mohammad and any Arab is: Where do they expect the Jews to live, be independent and have freedom of religion?  I told him I understand his feelings of being a minority.  I mentioned my family’s history from Mashhad where they were forced to convert to Islam, to Israel where they are free as Jews.  It is the only place where Jews can live freely.  Even in the US, the greatest democracy and defender of human rights I am in the minority.  Mohammad had no answer for me.

I want to stress here that I have followed many opinions of moderate Arabs.  They invariably find intelligent informed facts to point out why Jews cannot keep the state of Israel into the foreseeable future:

The Arabs build their homes along the slope of the mountains.  Jews build high rise buildings that stick out of the natural curve of the hill.  They do not belong in this land.

The title of this talk is most ubiquitous: Israel cannot be Jewish and Democratic.  

There are a million ways to prove this point, but I stress: Israel MUST be Jewish and democratic.  It has to be.  There is no other option.  The Arab neighbors of Israel need to accept it, understand it and participate in making sure this is the case.

The continuous efforts of Arabs to criticize everything done by Israel, to demonize it, boycott and sanction it only prolongs the conflict and there will never be any winners.

The announcement about the speaker: 

Since its inception, Israel was established as a constitutional democracy, even in the absence of a constitution, primarily due to the leading role that the Supreme Court has played in this context. In this talk, Professor Wattad will address various perceptions of Jewish democracy, recent changes in Israeli distribution of power, how Israel’s minorities are affected, and how a Jewish democracy will and should play out in Israel’s future. From his unique perspective, he will also discuss the importance of the court system and rights for minorities, as well as current threats to Israel’s democracy.

Professor Mohammed S. Wattad is a legal scholar specializing in international and comparative criminal law, comparative constitutional law, international law, and legal issues surrounding war, torture, and terrorism. A graduate of Haifa University School of Law, Wattad holds a Master of Law degree from The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He also attended Columbia University as a Fulbright Scholar, where he earned his Juris Doctorate and another Master of Law degree. From 2003-2004, he served as a legal clerk at the Supreme Court of Israel under the supervision of Justice Dalia Dorner. He is currently an assistant professor at Zefat College School of Law in Israel and is editor-in-chief of the Journal 'Medicine and Law'.

Ethnicizing Soccer

On Feb 23 I attended a lecture at UCLA Center for Jewish Studies:

People of the Book or People of the (Foot) Ball? Ethnicizing European and Latin American Soccer.

This sounded like such a benign subject.

The first speaker was Raanan Rein from Tel Aviv University.  He talked about soccer in Argentina.

The second speaker, John Efron a historian from UC Berkeley talked about soccer in the UK.  In London the Jews support these soccer teams: Arsenal, Tottenham and Chelsea.

For some reason Tottenham is considered the only “Yuden” team.  They play in the White Hart Lane stadium.

He described the chanting in the stadium in a scary manner.  Imagine a drum beat and the sound of 40,000 men chanting: YID, YID,  YID, YID,  YID, YID.  This chantings goes on for 90 minutes!

He had a video taken on a London train of a group of men singing:

I got foreskin

I got foreskin

Don’t have you?

Fucking Jew!

The worst chant is the sound of hissing, sssssssssssssss  imitating the sound of gas in the gas chambers.

In the following discussion the differences between the US and  Europe were pointed out: America society is quite violent with many guns everywhere.  At the football stadium people are “better behaved.”  European societies are not as violent, the violence erupts in the football stadiums.  

About the speakers:

John M. Efron (UC Berkeley)

While most historians would agree as to the centrality of sports in general and of soccer in particular in Latin American societies, very little has been written on ethnicity and sports in such immigrant societies as Argentina and Brazil. As far as the historiography of the Jewish experience in Latin America is concerned, hardly any scholarly works exist that are devoted to popular culture, particularly that of unaffiliated Jews.

Raanan Rein examines Argentine football as a space of both prejudice and dialogue. Rein argues that for the first immigrant generation, belonging to this club was a way of becoming Argentines. For the next generation, it was a way of maintaining ethnic Jewish identity, while for the third it has become a family tradition.

Raanan Rein