Is this anti-Semitism — practiced by Jews?
On April 8, five days before rabid Jew-hater Frazier Glenn Cross Jr., 73 — also known as Frazier Glenn Miller — allegedly shot dead three people outside two Jewish-run facilities in Kansas (the victims were two Methodists and a Catholic), then was seen on TV shouting “Heil Hitler” from the back of a police car, New York’s guardians of the Hebrew faith geared up for battle.
But the targets of Jewish ire were not Ku Klux Klan members or neo-Nazis. They were fellow Jews.
Some 200 people demonstrated in front of the Midtown offices of the Jewish-run nonprofit UJA-Federation of New York. They were furious that members of several left-leaning Jewish organizations were invited by sponsors to march in this year’s 50th annual Celebrate Israel Parade (formerly called the Israel Day Parade). The June 1 event is expected to draw some 35,000 revelers set to march up Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue.
Members of the lefty groups are no better than Jew-bashers, protesters argue. That’s because they support the boycott of products manufactured in Israel’s West Bank, whose ownership is claimed by Palestinians.
“Many of these ‘Jewish groups’ are financed by anti-Semites, anti-Israel [factions] and Jew haters,’’ Rabbi Elie Abadie, MD, of the Edmond J. Safra Synagogue on the Upper East Side, alleged in an open letter to the heads of the UJA-Federation and the New York Jewish Community Relations Council, which organize the parade. “Their sole mission is to delegitimize and demonize the state of Israel until its extinction.’’
“In relation to this recent incident in Kansas, violence against Jews is an outgrowth of hatred and dehumanization of Jews,’’ Beth Gilinsky, founder of the National Conference on Jewish Affairs, told me.
It can’t be denied that Jews are targeted for violence in this country at an alarming rate. The most recent FBI statistics reveal that out of 1,340 hate crimes against members of religious groups in 2012 — from verbal harassment to physical assaults — 62.4 percent of the victims were Jewish. Compare that to Muslims, who made up just 11.6 percent of hate-crime victims that year.
Of course, not everyone is as brave as Scarlett Johansson.
The sultry Jewish actress won international condemnation — and my deepest respect — when she refused to withdraw from her role as brand ambassador for SodaStream, drink-carbonation devices, which are made in a factory on Israel’s West Bank. Instead, she resigned as global ambassador of Oxfam International, a humanitarian organization that’s hostile to Israel’s West Bank presence.
“I remain a supporter of economic cooperation and social interaction between a democratic Israel and Palestine,” the 29-year-old star of “The Avengers’’ said in January.
“SodaStream is a company that is not only committed to the environment but to building a bridge to peace between Israel and Palestine, supporting neighbors working alongside each other, receiving equal pay, equal benefits and equal rights.’’
Go, ScarJo!
Leaders of the organizations identified as hostile to Jewish interests maintain that they are not enemies of the faith.
Nathan Hersh, acting executive director of Partners for Progressive Israel, agreed that his nonprofit human-rights group seeks a boycott of products made in the West Bank. But he insisted that his group does not support the international BDS — boycott, divestment and sanctions — movement, which seeks to end all investment in Israel and halt the importation of all Israeli products. Naomi Paiss, vice president of public affairs for the New Israel Fund, told me that her organization, which supports equal rights for everyone in Israel, also does not stand behind BDS. But, “we do oppose the occupation’’ by Israel of areas that she said were seized from Palestinians. B’Tselem, a human-rights group, was also blasted for failing to stand by Israel.
Richard Allen, founder of JCCWatch.org, which monitors treachery by Jewish groups, thinks it makes little difference whether boycotters claim only to reject West Bank products — any boycott hurts Israel.
Reject anti-Semitism.
Be like Scarlett Johansson.
Hey, WTC, WTF?
Two people breezed into 1 World Trade Center last week, proving that no adult is watching the site where thousands were slaughtered on 9/11/2001.
A 54-year-old man walked past a security guard who was talking to a truck driver making a delivery. Stopped by another guard, the guy was given a trespassing ticket. A construction worker on his way to a job interview at the site didn’t know where he was supposed to go, so he followed a truck on foot through an open gate. He was stopped but not charged.
Three parachutists and their lookout man were indicted on felony-burglary plus lesser charges last week after the daredevils sneaked into 1 World Trade Center, still under construction, and jumped off the top of the roof in September. It was “amazing,’’ ironworker James Brady, 32, who helped build the tower, told The Post about the jump. “No, I wouldn’t do it again.’’
Last month, a 16-year-old New Jersey boy climbed through a hole in the fence and took a ride to the 88th floor with a clueless elevator operator. He walked past a sleeping security guard on the 104th floor, then spent nearly two hours taking pictures on the roof before being arrested and charged with misdemeanors and trespassing, a violation.
Joe Dunne, chief security officer for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, said his agency could dismiss a security contractor after a review. Why wait?
Heed the ‘neigh’-sayers
Is Mayor Bill de Blasio backing away from his vow to ban what he calls “inhumane’’ horse-drawn carriages from city streets? In a Google Hangout video chat last week, the mayor, who once said he’d ban carriages during his first week in office, said he expects the City Council to put on the unemployment line some 220 horses and their 300 human drivers — not now, but by the end of the year.
A recent Quinnipiac University shows that 64 percent of city voters want to keep hooves clopping in New York. Hunky “Schindler’s List’’ star Liam Neeson told me in January that if horses, which are well-treated by their owners, lose their jobs, “They’ll die, you know, darlin’.’’
The mayor didn’t show up for a stables tour he was expected to take with Neeson last month, prompting the actor to say that de Blasio “should have manned up and come.’’ Man up, Mayor.
Abandon this foolish ban.
Chill out, NY
Quit complaining. The Farmers’ Almanac predicts that the city is due for a hot, humid and rainy summer.
Bring it!
I’ll take that over a polar vortex.