Chaverim y'karim - dear friends,

Thursday night, Amy and I were sitting in our living room enjoying a quiet moment to practice Hebrew. Yes, that is part of our joy: improving our Hebrew :)! Since last July, Amy has been in a Hebrew Ulpan (intensive Hebrew class) called "Citizen Cafe" and a couple of times a week we sit to work on her homework together. Since our Hebrew skills are complimentary, it is easy for us to spend 30 minutes reviewing vocabulary, listening to video clips in Hebrew and practice speaking in Hebrew. The organizers of the course make it a point not to speak about anything political, so we focus on cultural and social topics with nothing about the war or the situation with the hostages.  

It's a m'chayeh (wonderful moment) when we can take a few minutes to do something fun and since we both love Hebrew, we both benefit from a dive into our people's ancient and modern language. 

A pogrom in Amsterdam?

Just as we were finishing her homework last Thursday, we saw strange headlines from The Jerusalem Post and The Times of Israel. There was something about a pogrom in Amsterdam. Details were still forthcoming but this much was confirmed: there had been a ‘pogrom' (an organized attack on Jews) on the streets of Amsterdam. Israeli soccer fans were attacked by gangs of Muslims and Arabs who came armed with clubs and knives. In some cases, cars were used as weapons and there were Israelis attacked and whose whereabouts were unknown.  

From our earlier laughter over silly mistakes in Hebrew, suddenly we were thrust into the reality of being Jewish, being Israeli, and having Hebrew as your native tongue. 

Israelis had gone to Amsterdam to support their Tel Aviv Maccabi team play and they were met with a pogrom on, ironically, the 86th anniversary of Kristallnacht. Clearly, the Amsterdam police failed to protect Israelis and Jews - what will never be known is how much of that failure was intentional. 

Before going to sleep on Thursday night, I noticed there were no "Breaking News" emails from The New York Times or The Washington Post, which are not shy about dropping emails about something that is "breaking." In fact, countless times, I get emails from those two papers and wonder if they are more interested in marketing rather than breaking news. 

Differences in News Coverage

I realize, respect, and understand that the NYT and the WaPo have a different audience and different missions than the newspapers of Israel. That being said, the coverage of events in Amsterdam last Thursday night - and the unfolding reporting - has made clear, yet again, that if you want to know about anything related to the Israel and/or the Jewish world, The Times of Israel on-line articles and podcasts as well as reporting from The Jerusalem Post are vitally important. 

Aside from learning about the pogrom in a more timely fashion — the difference in the reporting is huge and I do want to outline some of these important differences.

NPR’s coverage was entirely predictable. NPR's local reporter, Terry Schultz, explained that on Friday morning, increased security was called out to the Amsterdam synagogues and that the mayor decried Amsterdam's failure to protect the Jews in WW2 and again on that fateful night last Thursday. She was "ashamed of her city and furious." Nonetheless, NPR's host, Scott Simon, inquired about an incident not covered by the Israeli media. He asked about a series of actions that he implied provoked the pogrom - namely of Israelis who tore down a Palestinian flag and chanted praise at the destruction in Gaza. There was no mention of the attacks as organized, as being perpetrated by Arabs and Muslims, or of the horrors done to Israelis who were seeking safety. 

The New York Times and Washington Post articles were equally disappointing. Though the NYT acknowledged the assailants as Arabs and Muslims, they neither mentioned that the attack was orchestrated nor how traumatic it was for the Israelis. In fact, if you simply read the headlines, you might think it was just a "brawl between soccer fans" which implies that it was about rivalries and not an ancient form of Jew-hating. The headline of the WaPo described the night as a “black night for Amsterdam.” The article seemed to excuse the violence as it reported that "... tensions had already flared the night before the match, police said, after Maccabi fans vandalized a taxi and set fire to a Palestinian flag.” It went on to discuss the war in Gaza and the war in Lebanon - almost implying that Israeli self-defense has its cost and that is a pogrom on Israelis traveling abroad.

You may be interested to note how the news article published in The Free Press was more balanced than the coverage in our legacy newspapers. 

The Times of Israel deployed far more graphic language and images. With headlines "They came in masses," and "Attacked us all", the reader learns how Maccabi Tel Aviv fans faced genuine horrors. According to the ToI, the attack was organized, Dutch security forces were nowhere to be found, and the masked assailants shouted pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel slogans while they hunted, beat and harassed the Israelis.  

I admit to being very surprised that the ToI did not mention that there were Israelis who were antagonistic and misbehaved. In general, the ToI does not excuse or cover up for poorly behaved Israelis. There is an excellent opinion piece in The Forward by Nadav Ziv which helps us understand where Israelis were poorly behaved but that NOTHING excuses the beating, terrorizing, harming Israeli soccer fans and disrupting life for the citizenry of Amsterdam. 

Context is Everything

Douglas Murray adds an interesting historical perspective and well worth your time.   

Lastly, I was particularly grateful to Dan Senor for hosting Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Omer Bigger on his podcast, Call Me Back. Senor’s reporting of this important event was outstanding. You may recall that I had the distinct honor to interview Ayaan Hirsi Ali in Amy's synagogue in September. Ali is a Somali-born Dutch, American activist. She is a former Dutch member of Parliament and left Holland on account the danger posed by her being an outspoken critic of radical Islam. Omer Bigger is an Israeli tech worker who lives in Amsterdam and who described his experience that night and more broadly he spoke about Israeli/Jewish life in Amsterdam today.

Conclusion

It is safe to study Hebrew in the confines of my living room and I do believe it is safe to speak Hebrew outside my home. But I will be honest - I would feel less safe speaking Hebrew in the subway in NYC or walking the streets of DC. There were two days of violence and unease in Amsterdam. Think of the terror that was caused - not because some Israelis acted disparagingly. I'm embarrassed by my fellow Jews who use vile language. They were wrong to do so. Nothing justifies the thuggishness and brazen anti-liberal, anti-Western, antisemitic behavior that Ayaan Hirsi Ali warned her fellow Dutchmen about 20 years ago. The pogrom of November 7th in Amsterdam fits into a pattern of behavior our people have known from Kishnev (1903) to Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia (1938) to Israel (2023) - and countless times in between. Once it was the Cossacks, then it was the Nazis, and now it is radical Islam. Each time it is against us for being Jews, for daring to live, and now, in our era, to have power and seek to survive. 

One of the statements that the NYTimes cited as "anti-Arab" was "Am Yisrael Chai - the People of Israel lives."  Just to be clear: The NYTimes wants its readers to know that the violence was not a response to a few Israelis who burned a Palestinian flag, which was 100% wrong of them. It's that the Israelis dare chant that we live.

It's our living that is the problem (see: Dara Horn's People Love Dead Jews). In the meantime, Amy and I will keep studying Hebrew. And we, at Temple Sholom, will continue to seek means to foster rich and meaningful community.

Am Yisrael Chai! 

Rabbi Mark Cohn

rabbicohn@tsholom.org 

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NOVEMBER Lunch & Learns @ Noon in the Library

Nov 12, 19, 26 (Tuesdays) At my installation, when I spoke of being more or less "committed, serious, engaged, observant" - what does that mean in practice? See "Jewpilled," "Jewish Pride is Not Enough," and "Show Up to Synagogue," and (recent articles) that fit the topic nicely.

Nov. 15 (Friday) 6:30pm - THIS WEEK! 

IN Case you missed it ... way back in September, our very own Jeremy Stone gave a fabulous concert called "Music & Moods." The playing and teaching were magic!