December 22, 2011 | 8:23 pm

Wiesenthal Center calls on UNESCO to cut funding for Palestinian magazine

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

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Speaking of anti-Semitic awareness being raised by the Simon Wiesenthal Center, the organization led by Rabbi Marvin Hier is calling on UNESCO to cut all funding to the Palestinian youth magazine Zayafuna. The Wiesenthal Center says that the magazine published an article by a 10-year-old Palestinian girl describing a dream in which Hitler told the girl: “Yes.  I killed them [the Jews] so you would all know that they are a nation who spreads destruction all over the world.”

The JPost has more about the letter that the Wiesenthal Center’s Shimon Samuels sent to the Director General of UNESCO:

“Apparently, the magazine’s positive messages on coexistence and peace apply to all but Jews and Israelis,” Samuels wrote. “Through a young girl, the Holocaust is presented as an act for the benefit of humanity.”

The Palestinian Authority’s deputy minister of education and its former minister of education are both on the magazine’s advisory board, Samuels noted.

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While Samuels noted the October edition states that “opinions expressed in this magazine do not necessarily express UNESCO’s views,” Samuels wrote that this disclaimer was “hardly a fitting response to the discovery of the repugnant Holocaust celebration in the February issue.”

Read the rest here.

Rabbi Hier has not been happy with UNESCO’s response—“Allow me to underscore that UNESCO takes this matter extremely seriously and it cannot but strongly deplore and condemn the statements… We will bring this matter to the attention of the concerned Palestinian authorities.”—and notes that the United States is the largest funder of UNESCO (though I think that the United States is the largest funder of most international aid organizations).

December 22, 2011 | 7:11 pm

Nate ‘n Al now at LAX

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

I landed at LAX at 5 am this morning, following a mele kelikimaka pre-Christmas on the Big Island. If only I had known that Nate ‘n Al has opened in Terminal 2.

Bloggish reports:

The company in charge of the food overhaul at LAX, HMS Host, called the more than 66-year-old restaurant “a landmark in Los Angeles and one of the best delicatessens in the world,” LAist reported.

“Nate ‘n Al epitomizes comfort food,” the HMS Host statement continued, “which is just what the LAX traveler needs before or after a flight.”

No word on whether Larry King will be trekking down to Terminal 2 for his daily (or almost daily) bowl of blueberries, which is reportedly what the veteran newsman orders when he visits Nate ‘n Al in Beverly Hills.

Get hungry here.

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December 21, 2011 | 2:00 pm

Top 10 anti-Semitic and anti-Israel slurs of 2011

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

This one slipped onto the backburner for me: the Simon Wiesenthal Center has complied 2011’s top ten anti-Israel and anti-Semitic slurs. There are much more offensive statements on the list, but our old friend the Rev. Jeremiah Wright comes in at No. 10:

10. “The state of Israel is an illegal, genocidal place… to equate Judaism with the state of Israel is to equate Christianity with [rapper] Flavor Flav.”

– Rev. Jeremiah Wright in a speech to thousands of people, June 14, 2011, Baltimore, Maryland.

Read the rest, and see links to the original sources, here.

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December 20, 2011 | 9:58 am

‘Bethlehemian Rhapsody’

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

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December 19, 2011 | 12:20 pm

Tri-Faith plans church, mosque and synagogue for same campus

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Interesting story from Jaweed Kaleem about a new interfaith effort in Omaha, Neb. The organization Tri-Faith Initiative is starting to raise funds for a 35-acre campus that would have a house of worship for each of the three Abrahamic religions. This is definitely a unique approach to interfaith-community building.

Kaleem writes:

“We thought, let’s intentionally choose our neighbors,” says Vic Gutman, a spokesman for the Tri-Faith Initiative, which launched five years ago as a grassroots interfaith effort and quickly gained funding and community support among the city’s religious leaders. “We want to form a relationship between all Jews, all Muslims and all Christians.”

The group, which announced this week that each religious group had closed on land purchase deals for the interfaith campus that total $5 million, will also build a Tri-Faith Center that will have educational and social facilities for use by all the campus’ religious groups.

Gutman says the project is one of the first in the nation to intently build houses of worship of the three Abrahamic faiths next to each other. Temple Israel, an 800-family strong Reform tradition synagogue that’s the oldest and biggest Jewish house of worship in the state, has plans to open by the High Holy Days in 2013.

The church will be Episcopal, which isn’t much of a surprise. Check out a map of the planned campus and read the rest here.

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December 19, 2011 | 8:28 am

Why do evangelicals support thrice-married Gingrich?

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Newt Gingrich, whose understanding of the role of the judicial branch under the U.S. Constitution is absolutely terrifying, has been married three times and cheated on his first two wives. Why then are evangelicals supporting him over squeaky-clean Mitt Romney? Do people really believe a politician who says that they’re reformed and have repented of their mistakes?

Bob Vander Plaats, president of The Family Leader, told NPR:

“The centerpiece of our faith is forgiveness,” he says.

Vander Plaats says evangelicals also like Gingrich because they want a conservative they can trust.

“There’s a certain anxiety and, dare I say, fearfulness about the world we live in today,” he says, and “they’re probably willing to forgive and move on from the baggage of the past, the misgivings of the past, if they really believe he’s the best one prepared to lead to a safer, more vibrant America.”

Sorry, but that’s absurd. I don’t know any of my fellow evangelicals who got into Bill Clinton’s corner because it was important to forgive him for his philandering. To me the answer here is simple: Gingrich is outperforming Romney because Romney is Mormon.

Forget the fact that Gingrich is Catholic. There is plenty of theological tension between evangelicals and Catholics, but as I’ve mentioned over and over, a lot of Christians, if not most evangelicals, do not believe that Mormons are Christians of any kind. Which is unfortunate because Romney might actually be able to get something down in Washington, while I fear that Gingrich would just inflame both sides of Congress and lead to more intransigence.

Hmmm ... maybe Gingrich should have kept his Iowa political director.

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December 18, 2011 | 10:02 pm

Israeli changes name to ‘Mark Zuckerberg’

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Maybe you’ve heard of Mark Zuckerberg? He’s that Facebook guy and the world’s youngest billionaire and kind of a big deal. It’s understandable that people would want to be like Zuckerberg, even if he is notoriously awkward and salty. But who wants to actually be Mark Zuckerberg?

Short answer: Rotem Guez.

The Israeli entreprenuer has officially changed his name to Mark Zuckerberg. (Check the photo: That’s Guez/Zuckerberg holding up his Israeli passport.) It’s a gimmick, a way of getting back at Facebook. This Zuckerberg runs the online Like Store, and a Facebook attorney reportedly told him to shut it down or face a lawsuit.

Via the AP:

He’s telling Facebook: “If you want to sue me, you’re going to have to sue Mark Zuckerberg.”

Much more on the threatened lawsuit from ZDNet.

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December 18, 2011 | 6:57 pm

Tebow gets visit from Jesus on ‘SNL’

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Tim Tebow may have lost to Tom Brady and the Patriots today—he did—but he’s officially become a cultural icon. Forget marrying a model. Tebow has “Saturday Night Live” and a visit from Jesus.

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December 18, 2011 | 6:51 pm

Whole Foods stocks shelves with “Hanukkah favorite” matzo

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Don’t be embarrassed if you sometimes confuse Hanukkah gelt with Passover matzo. The Whole Foods in Los Angeles’ Fairfax district—home to Canter’s and a whole lot of Jews—made that mistake in thinking the coming of Hanukkah meant that they should get all that unleavened bread out of the back.

Check out the photo that Lara Rabinovich snapped for Heeb of Whole Foods encouraging shoppers to “Share Hanukkah Favorites”—you know, stuffing and matzo, lots of matzo.

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December 16, 2011 | 12:57 am

Christopher Hitchens, atheist author, dies

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Christopher Hitchens, the acclaimed journalist who a few years ago became a face of the evangelical atheist movement, has died. He was 62.

I used to mentioned Hitchens often on this blog—here’s a good one—but it looks like his most recent appearance was in 2010 when he talked about his views on dying in the above video. NPR has more on Hitchens’ life and death:

For years, Hitchens had toured the country debating religious figures about his utter disbelief in the existence of a God. He didn’t waver in the face of his inability to treat his disease. To the very end, whatever the argument joined, Hitchens’ voice was an original.

Read the rest here.

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December 15, 2011 | 1:29 pm

Onion: Tebow first Christian in NFL

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Year In Review: Tim Tebow Becomes First Christian To Play In NFL
The Onion recaps the big stories from 2011. Would you believe that Tim Tebow is on the list? Would you also believe that he’s the NFL’s first Christian? Maybe that explains why 30% of Sportscenter is now labeled “Tebow Time.”

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December 14, 2011 | 1:27 pm

Gingrich’s Iowa political director resigns over ‘cult of Mormon’ comment

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Newt Gingrich hired his Iowa political director after the man, Craig Bergman, said this in a focus group for The Iowa Republican:

“There is a national pastor who is very much on the anti-Mitt Romney bandwagon,” Craig Bergman said. “A lot of the evangelicals believe God would give us four more years of Obama just for the opportunity to expose the cult of Mormon…There’s a thousand pastors ready to do that.”

That was just last week. But then Bergman’s “cult of Mormon” comment went viral, and now Gingrich has asked him to resign.

It’s not entirely surprising that Bergman, who identifies as a dispensationalist Christian, would consider Mormonism a cult. Christianity has had a strain of antagonism toward Mormons since Joseph Smith founded the church 181 years ago. And as I mentioned in October, after a megachurch pastor supporting Rick Perry said Mormonism was a cult, “During the last election cycle, Romney’s Mormon faith was a big sticking point for a lot of Republican believers and evangelicals said he was not ‘guided by God.’”

But what is surprising, as Joanna Brooks notes, is that Gingrich wouldn’t look for a man with a little more political touch to head such an important part of his presidential campaign:

But most revealing is the fact that Gingrich entrusted a key position in an important and volatile primary contest to Bergman—a passed-over political operative who talks like a tobacco-chewing member of a nineteenth century midwestern anti-Mormon mob.

Thoughts?

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