Satmar protest against Israel/Netanyahu's speech

Barbara

Wed, Mar 04 2015, 11:34 pm

amother wrote:

So if Obama decides to sign an agreement tomorrow with Iran and decides to lift the sanctions and allow them to build a nuclear weapon then will you be ok with it? What if Obama decides to call for a two state resolution, will you be ok with that? Obama has a tendency to do whatever he pleases so to what extent will you support him and allow him full control because he is the leader of your country?

Sigh.

The agreement prohibits Iran from enriching uranium to build a weapon. It calls for international inspections and oversight. The nature and degree of that oversight, and what they will be able to do with uranium (including medical use) are being negotiated. So "Obama" would not be permitting Iran to buils a nuclear weapon.

The alternative is war, not sanctions. Because sanctions aren't going to keep Iran from getting uranium any more than any blockade has kept the Palestinians from getting weapons. And with no agreement, no inspections, no oversight, all you have left is attacking before it's too late. Netanyahu certainly didn't provide an alternative.

And Hashem willing, there will be a 2 state solution. The only reasons that Israel doesn't want to accept it now are (1) the Palestinians are insisting upon Jerusalem, and that is not going to happen; (2) the Israelis need an assurance of peace with a Palestinian state, and that's not happening now. But really, what else do you think is going to happen? Do you think that Israel is going to reabsorb those territories and make those people citizens? That they're going to emigrate peacefully -- and who is taking them?

I presume that you are aware that President Obama is president of the United States, not Israel. Obama can't impose anything on Israel. And Israel is free to refuse all the money that Obama has provided for iron dome, and all of the other assistance the U.S. provides.

Did you read Kerry's diatribe to the UN Human Rights Council, about how it's obsession with The only democracy in the Middle East delegitizes it, and how it should be considering the real human rights abuses in the world. I thought not.

amother

Thu, Mar 05 2015, 9:13 am

A - Golus is not about fighting back physically, this attitude is one of kochi veotzem yadi. We can use shtadlanus, and tefillah, and in a democracy we can vote and lobby, but saying Never Again will we let ourselves be slaughtered is disrespectful to the 6/7 million kedoshim. It smells of "God, this time we will take care of ourselves, thanks for nothing" ch"v!!! Seriously, does Lakewood have an army to protect itself in case of a holocaust? Does Boro Park? It's not something yidden have done in golus. The golus Jew survived not by fighting, but by the grace of God. The attitude of "that wasn't good enough, we can't trust God anymore chv... and we refuse to be golus Jews any longer" is one the Rebbe cried about.

B - We love the Land, but don't support the State that is metamei it. As the Land is like the palace of the King, both kedusha and tamah have so much more spiritual power there. Had the Zionists built a Jewish homeland in Uganda the pain wouldn't be as great. There is a sizeable Satmar community in Israel, and they don't take funding from the government, at least not on an institutional level. We do visit (but some people don't use ElAl - and most don't visit certain institutions like Yad Vashem. The Kosel is also a place some people have davened at, but the shtark Satmar would not visit until Moshiach rebuilds it to its former glory. You can call it being kafi tov, but from our POV it's a hashkafadig statement of "we didn't ask you to fight wars in golus to give us back this holy place, you didn't do it for me so I am not guilty by association". We wouldn't have lost access to it in the first place without the zionist movement angering the Arabs.)

C - The Satmar Rebbe believed that the medinah went against the Torah, and very many agreed with him. In that sense, we represent a much larger group of Torah true yidden than care to admit. I apologize if my word choice came across like there are no legitimately Torah true Jews with opposing opinions, but as a Satmar chassid, I believe this to be the most authentic way to live the Torah. If I didn't, why would I be/stay pinkt Satmar? (Even if someone does think that Judaism equals zionism, the very fact that there are exceptions who don't believe so makes it a valid point to declare and remind the rest of us.) I wish I remember which non-chassidish gadol it was that said if there had been no Satmar Rebbe to lead the fight against the medinah he would have to do so himself, just so there would be a conscience reminding chareidi world Jewry that a secular state of kefirah is a tragedy, whenever they get too caught up in the fantasy its politicians spin. It's completely fine with me if you disagree, but remember we don't hate you. We love each Jew, even each chayal, and mourn each one who nebech falls (Hashem yishmor, please God no more) for a cause that has brought so much bloodshed. We love each Jew, whatever they believe - our chessed institutions will never ask you if you are zionist or not. We love the Land, we just hate the situation and wish the world reaches its ultimate tikkun with Moshiach, just like you hope. And no one, not even the most ardent zionist, can claim that the situation now is perfect or even great. So we all need to put our differences aside today and daven for the geulah.

Oh and you can give tzedakah - or not. Today we give to kol haposhet yad, but on other days you are free to send Satmar collectors away empty handed. Smile

Maya

Thu, Mar 05 2015, 9:39 am

amother wrote:

I personally do. (Though I've never heard of anyone refer to a satmar ideology separate from the antizionism aspect, please enlighten me if you know more about this. Satmar was originally not so much a chassidis as it was a shittah. As the Bnei Yoel are quick to point out.)
.

There is actually a pretty big and very active Zionist movement right in the heart of Williamsburg, a group made up of mostly Satmar men and women. So many Satmar people are poking holes in the anti Zionist ideals and realizing how it holds no water.

The next generation is not able to be influenced and convinced just by charm, as had been the case with our parents and grandparents. They need answers that make sense, and if they don't get it, their opinions will change, no matter how brainwashed they had been throughout their childhoods. That's what is happening regarding the anti Zionist ideal. It doesn't make sense anymore to a large group of Satmar people. You'd be very surprised to find some of the most Frum, ehrliche people in Williamsburg in that group.

amother

Thu, Mar 05 2015, 10:17 am

Maya wrote:

I did not know that. They need to hire a new PR rep to spread the word. Wink

I know you can be Satmar and wear a sheitel till the floor on an unshaved head.

I know you can wear seams and all that and not be Satmar.

I know you can be very ehrlich and eidel not be Satmar (duh).

I know that people don't fit neatly into boxes, but this is new to me. I did not think of Satmar as a label people would keep for themselves if they no longer believed the shittah. Especially to form a cohesive movement opposing it... It's not just being Satmarprox (??), secretly not believing but staying put for whatever reason, it's a whole new level of dissent. It's an attempt to redefine a movement - like Republicans declaring themselves liberals . (I'm not sure that analogy works, I'll need to think about it to come up with a better one.)

As I said earlier, Satmar is not only a chassidis with minhagim and chumros, its defining characteristic is the shittah hakdosha, veyoel moshe... (remember that song? LOL

)

I guess at this point it is just another chassidis, or rather just another group/label, and people have decided that just because I was born here doesn't mean I have to agree with everything...

I get that, but it still sounds weird to me. I guess times are indeed changing. Labels and boxes don't mean much anymore.

I guess the message of the day is to look at what's hidden beneath the surface, and to ignore the masks people wear.

dancingqueen

Thu, Mar 05 2015, 10:57 am

Satmar amother so you're saying that being anti-Israel is the essense of being satmar?

I still cannot comprehend calling the state of Israel, a home where many Jews have escaped other persecutions, a tragedy. I'm much more inclined to call the world event right before the state of Israel was formed a tragedy. And as to behavior during galut some of the things I've read about your leader's behavior during that time raises my eyebrows. that aside I see no reason that we have to be sitting ducks until mashiach comes.

The real issue to me though, is that fine you don't support the state of Israel. Then don't live there or visit counting on the protection of chayalim and the iron dome. And when you do visit, you boycott el al and other Jewish businesses? Isn't it a mitzvah to support other Jews in business. And most important though you say you care about chayalim dying, loudly protesting the state of Israel makes it look like you don't and really makes all of us look bad. In other words total chillul Hashem. Saying tehilim and davening? Great! Loudly protesting against fellow Jews? Not so great!

You seem like a thoughtful person who is probably wonderful in many ways though my ideology is 180 from yours, I still wish you purim sameach! Smile

amother

Thu, Mar 05 2015, 11:21 am

The State of Israel, which is used as the excuse for shedding of Jewish blood, is indeed a tragedy, and at the very least has led to tragedy. I'm not naive enough to say that all of radical Islamic violence is based on the Palestinian issue, but yes, that clash is a major catalyst for a huge part of it. Denying that is denying facts. Acknowledging that does not in any way negate the horrors of the Holocaust.

If the Holocaust teaches us anything, it's that even enlightened, tolerant, and sophisticated places (Germany...) are never truly safe for yidden if Hashem wills it not to be. The yidden said about Poland, Poh-lin, here we will rest (from golus) at one point in history, (need to check references to be sure exact era) and that didn't end so well.

We are grateful to America for being a malchus shel chessed, and Jews around the world are grateful to their country for giving them freedom to worship Hashem. But to trust that this time we are safe, here or in Israel, is being naive. Of course we don't walk around in fear of the next Holocaust, but neither do we declare that next time we will trust our own power and fight back.

The tragedy of the second chorbun would have been so much less horrific if the yidden would not have revolted again and again, as the chachamim warned them not to. It's well and good to rely on armies and tanks, but at the end of the day we all know that the survival of yidden in golus (and in Israel now, too) is only because Hashem protects us.

The attitude of "we will do better than Hashem in protecting ourselves" is what the Rebbe called kefirah.

Barbara

Thu, Mar 05 2015, 12:33 pm

amother wrote:

Your post shows a stunning ignorance of history. The Arabs were killing Jews well before 1948. Had Israel not been created, they would have continued killing Jews, or more likely simply exiled them from Palestine. Israel is an "excuse" for anti-semitism, not a cause.

Radical Islamic violence -- a la Al Queda and ISIS -- has nothing to do with Israel.

In any case, just a few incidents by those Arabs who were oh so peaceful until Israel was founded --

Battle of Tel Hai March 1, 1920 Arabs 13 8 Jews killed;[1] 5 Arabs killed.
Nebi Musa riots April 4–7, 1920 Arabs 9 5 Jews, 4 Arabs killed; 216 Jews, 18 Arabs, 7 Britons wounded[1][2][3]
Jaffa riots May 1–7, 1921 Arabs 95 48 Arabs, 47 Jews killed; 140 Jews, 73 Arabs wounded.
NA November 2, 1921 Arabs 5 5 Jews killed in Jerusalem in stabbing attack. Multiple wounded, including women and children.[4]
Palestine Riots August 23–26, 1929 Arabs 249 133 Jews, 116 Arabs killed; 339 Jews, 232 Arabs wounded [5][1][2][3][6]
Hebron massacre August 24, 1929 Arabs 67 67 Jews killed; 58 Jews wounded
Safed massacre August 29, 1929 Arabs 20 18–20 Jews killed; 80 Jews wounded (included in previous entry)[6]
1933 Palestine riots October 28, 1933 Arabs 20
The Bloody Day in Jaffa (Hebrew: יום הדמים ביפו) April 19–20, 1936 Arabs 21 9 Jews killed, 40 Jews wounded (11 critically) in Arab attack in Jaffa. Police killed two attackers. Further 7 Jews and 3 Arabs killed the next day[7][8][9]
NA July 07, 1937 Unknown 27 6 Jews and 21 Arabs killed in Haifa when bomb is thrown into a crowd at a marketplace. 11 Jews and 52 Arabs wounded [11][12]
NA August 13, 1937 Arabs 4 4 members of a Jewish family, 3 children, shot dead by Arabs who broke into their home in Safed[13]
NA November 9, 1937 Arabs 5 5 Jewish Keren Kayemet workers killed near Har Haruach by an Arab ambush. Ma'ale HaHamisha was named in their honor.[14]
N/A 28 March 1938 Arabs 6 6 Jewish passengers killed by Arabs while traveling from Haifa to Safed.[17]
N/A August 16, 1938 Arabs 3 A Jewish family was kidnapped by Arabs in Atlit. 3 killed.[22][23]
N/A September 14, 1938 Arabs 3 3 Jews killed in a bomb attack and ambush on a private vehicle near Nir David then: Tel Amal)[24] Several attackers killed by Britons.
1938 Tiberias pogrom October 2, 1938 Arabs 19 19 Jews were killed.[29]
1947 Jerusalem riots December 2, 1947 Arabs 14 8 Jews Reported Killed[39][40]
al-Tira December 12, 1947 Jewish militants 13 13 Arabs killed, 10 wounded[41][42]
N/A (See Beit Nabala) December 14, 1947 Arab Legion 13 13 Jews killed (some sources say 14); 9 Jews, 2 Britons, 1 Arab wounded in attack on military convoy near Lydda[1]
N/A December 24, 1947 Arab snipers, Jewish militants 8 4 Jews killed in Haifa by snipers, 4 Arabs killed in reprisals[1]
N/A December 26, 1947 Arab militants 0 7 Jews killed while driving in convoy to Jerusalem[1]
N/A December 28, 1947 Arab Snipers, Jewish militants 5 5 Jews killed in Bab el Wad by snipers, 5 Arabs killed in reprisals[1]
N/A January 3, 1948 Arab militants 4 4 Jews killed in Haifa[1]
N/A January 3, 1948 Arab militants 4 3 Jews, 1 Briton killed in Jerusalem[1]

amother

Thu, Mar 05 2015, 1:48 pm

Barbara wrote:

I am not as stunningly ignorant on the subject as you think, and there's no reason to be offensive.

I actually believe it to be both an excuse and a cause, depending on the individual in question.

Even before your post I was thinking if I should go back and edit that it was the zionist movement even before the State's founding that caused tremendous harm, because I actually do know of some of the tragedies you listed, notably the Chevron Massacre.

None of your examples predate zionism, but then I decided it really doesn't matter. You are 100% right in saying that they hate us anyway, they would kill us anyway, with or without a state, because that's just the way it is and obviously the way Hashem wants it. It was the rebbe's assertion that it would have been less so if we wouldn't have agitated about Jewish control of the Land, though that is hard, or rather, impossible, to prove either way.

In any case, besides the question of whether it does or doesn't directly lead to antisemitism, it was the Rebbe's belief that the movement and the State are hisgaros beumos, and he lamented that the New Jew (as opposed to the meek golus yid) was relying on an army and State to protect himself and leaving God out of the picture. The takeover of our promised land was not supposed to be forceful and violent, and shouldn't happen without unanimous worldwide consent, which will come when Moshiach does.

You may not agree with everything, or even anything, but there's no need for personal attacks or biting negativity here, all right?

Again, I'm not proselytizing, lol. I'm just sharing with those who didn't know that there actually is some meaning behind what you think are senseless and infuriating protests, and what you believe to be a chilul Hashem is viewed differently by us, and I guess vice versa.

amother

Thu, Mar 05 2015, 2:02 pm

sequoia wrote:

It doesn't freakin matter how YOU view it. It IS a chillul Hashem, because every single godd@mn murderous anti Semitic Jew hater on the planet invokes the "very religious ultra-Orthodox satmar" as being *on his side*.

People. Who. Murder. Jewish. Babies. Say. You. Are. On. Their. Side.

Got it?

They also say they do so because of the State.

I hear what you're saying. And I hear your pain... They are twisting our message - which is not that we want the State destroyed through violence Chv. If they use our protests as an excuse for that, well, that's the same argument as them using the State as an excuse, isn't it?

And if the message we want to send is that we want the violence to end on both sides of the conflict, and that we hope for some peaceful solution that does not involve the murder of Jews or any innocents, and perhaps no Jewish political control of the Land (though as I mentioned, no one can imagine a safe way that can happen bederech hateva), then I think there are many many more sane people out there who agree.