Basic HTML Version
8 HASHALOM May
2017
May 2017
HASHALOM
9
JEWISH WORLD
Today is a day to remember, reflect and look forward.
We are here to honour the victims of the Holocaust, an
unparalleled crime against humanity.
We are together to mourn the loss of so many and of so much.
The world has a duty to remember
I am humbled by the presence here today of Holocaust survivors.
Thank you for bearing witness across seven decades so that
others may live in dignity. There is no better education for the
future than the guarantee that we will always be able to remember
the past and to honour the victims of the tragedies of that past.
I would like to pay tribute to one survivor in particular, Elie Wiesel,
who passed away last year. He became one of the world’s most
passionate voices for mutual respect and acceptance, and the
United Nations was proud to have him as one of our Messengers
of Peace.
It would be a dangerous error to think of the Holocaust as simply
the result of the insanity of a group of criminal Nazis. On the
contrary, the Holocaust was the culmination of millennia of
hatred and discrimination targeting the Jews – what we now call
anti-Semitism.
Imperial Rome not only destroyed the temple in Jerusalem,
but also made Jews pariahs in many ways. The attacks and
abuse grew worse through the triumph of Christianity and the
propagation of the idea that the Jewish community should be
punished for the death of Jesus – an absurdity that helped to
trigger massacres and other tremendous crimes against Jews
around the world for centuries to come.
The same happened in my own country, Portugal, reaching its
height with the order by King Manuel in the 16th century expelling
all Jews who refused to convert. This was a hideous crime and
an act of enormous stupidity. It caused tremendous suffering
to the Jewish community – and deprived Portugal of much of
the country’s dynamism. Before long, the country entered a
prolonged cycle of impoverishment.
Many Portuguese Jews eventually settled in the Netherlands.
Lisbon’s loss was Amsterdam’s gain, as the Portuguese Jewish
community played a key role in transforming the Netherlands into
the global economic powerhouse of the 17th century.
The Portuguese example also demonstrates that anti-Semitism,
more than a question of religion, is essentially an expression
of racism. The proof is that the converted Jews, the so-called
“new Christians”, faced discrimination by the old Christians, and
suffered continued persecution by the Portuguese Inquisition.
When I became Prime Minister in 1995, I felt it was absolutely
necessary, even if only with a symbolic gesture, to demonstrate
my country’s rejection and repentance of Portugal’s merciless
attacks against the Jewish community.
In 1996, Parliament revoked the letter of expulsion. I then had
the honour of visiting the Portuguese Synagogue in Amsterdam
to formally present a copy of that decree and apologize on behalf
of my country. Tragically, that beautiful synagogue was almost
empty, because the community Portugal had expelled was
almost completely destroyed by the Holocaust. Anti-Semitism
always tends to come back.
Portugal recently adopted a law allowing the descendants
of those expelled in the 16th century to regain Portuguese
nationality. Last year, more than 400 took advantage of this offer.
I am also very proud to note that just a few weeks ago, my wife
signed, on behalf of the Lisbon Municipality, an agreement with
the Israeli Community of Lisbon to establish the Lisbon Jewish
Museum. This will be a way to pay tribute to the memory of those
my country mistreated so badly.
History keeps moving forward, but anti-Semitism keeps coming
back.
The renowned scholar Simon Schama has noted that in the 19th
century, Jews were even blamed for modernity, including for
disasters of international finance in which they themselves were
among the first victims.
Schama also noted that Jews often faced a lose-lose situation.
When they successfully integrated and came to “look like”
anyone else, they became subjects of suspicion. Others who
looked different were blamed for that, too. Both groups came
together in the Nazi crematoria.
After the Holocaust, the world seemed eager to find a more
cooperative path. The founding of the United Nations was one
expression of that moment. The UN Charter, the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights and the Genocide Convention
enshrined a commitment to equality and human rights.
Speech Of New UN Secretary-General
That Has Caused Palestinian Seething
By: Aussie Dave - Israellycool.com
A few days ago, on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, António Guterres, the new UN
Secretary-General, gave the following speech, which caused Palestinian hysterics.
JE IS W L
My word: Doing good is going strong
By Liat Collins - JPOST
Any day can be a Good Deeds Day and tikkun olam can begin at home, as a way of life.
One good turn deserves
another, so 1.1 million good
deeds deserve at least a
mention in a humble column,
especially as similar selfless
acts are spreading from Israel
around the world.
More than a million Israelis
marked Good Deeds Day on
March 28. Doing good is a
growth industry. International
Good Deeds Day will be held on April 2, when volunteers will be thinking
and acting positively in 93 countries.
Good Deeds Day is one of Israel’s best exports, right up there with Waze
and the disk-on-key (flash drive). It is a modern adaptation of an ancient
precept: “Derech eretz kadma latorah,” that behaving as a decent human
being comes before everything else.
Creating a specific day dedicated to doing good was the idea of
businesswoman and philanthropist Shari Arison, who launched the
project 11 years ago via Ruach Tova (Good Spirit), her nonprofit, which is
part of the Ted Arison Family Foundation.
“We have built an immense infrastructure of good deeds,” Arison said in
a press statement ahead of this year’s events. “Each individual can do a
good deed, but togetherness creates power. Together we can shift the
pendulum to the positive side, tapping into a tremendous source of hope.”
It is easy to mock Arison’s feel-good approach – who doesn’t believe we,
too, might have a happier attitude were we the country’s richest woman,
heir to a family fortune, whose family business includes being the major
stakeholder of a bank (Hapoalim, in the case of the ever-smiling Arison)?
But she seems to be on to something because the project gets bigger
from year to year, and part of the attraction is its simplicity. It is much
easier to commit to participating in a one-off project than to dedicating
time and energy in ongoing voluntary and philanthropic works.
In the beginning, in 2006, some 7,000 people took part. But all that
positive energy has created its own momentum and now nearly all
municipalities in the country, representing all sectors of the Israeli
population, and hundreds of schools, academic institutions, businesses,
organizations and the IDF, offer their services as part of the project.
The activities were as varied as the participants and included volunteers
painting houses and daycare facilities for the elderly; cleaning up beaches
and parks; renovating daycare facilities for children at risk; planting and
tending community gardens; packing and delivering food packages for
the needy; and recycling projects.
Among my favorites are the hair stylists who volunteered their services
cutting hair to be donated to make wigs for cancer sufferers. In a “pet
cause” close to my heart, the members of the Jerusalem Municipal
Veterinary Services carried out necessary renovations at the Jerusalem
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, and veterinarians
volunteered their time and surgical skills to neuter dogs and cats at the
shelter to help keep the city’s stray animal population down. The JSPCA
and other animal groups also used the day as a marketing tactic, the
perfect date to adopt a four-legged friend for life.
The suggested good deeds on the Good Spirit website range from small
to big, starting with a suggestion to smile at strangers, something that
can be done anywhere, any time. The events in Ramat Gan showed the
range of possibilities: Photos from a town square include a high-school
student dressed as a panda offering free hugs. Among the stands
promised by the organizers were a spot to write greetings cards; a “give
and take” market to recycle household items (perfect ahead of Passover);
free plant saplings; a story-telling area; information booths on different
charities; a Magen David Adom bloodmobile for those who wanted to
donate blood; and a place to sign up for an ADI (National Transplant and
Organ Donation) card – talk about a good deed living on.
As Arison posits, we are all rich with potential, body and soul when it
comes to doing something good and being a positive force.
IT’S NEVER too late to start, but obviously it’s easier to grab kids while
they are young and make doing good a part of their lives.
The Israeli state education system considers fostering a spirit of
volunteering an essential part of the curriculum. Students from 10th
grade on have to participate in a 60-hours-a-year “personal commitment”
program, volunteering in projects including helping in hospitals, health
fund clinics and old-age homes; serving with the ambulance, police or fire
services; packing food packages for the needy; repairing old computers
for use by those unable to afford new ones; and helping children with
illnesses and disabilities.
My curiosity piqued, I tossed the question among my Facebook friends
to see if other countries have “mandatory volunteering” requirements. A
friend in Hungary noted a relatively new compulsory 50-hours program
for high-school students as a prerequisite to taking final exams in their
last year. Canadian friends (and relatives) overwhelmingly responded
that schools (at least in Ontario) require 40 hours a year of service.
Many of those who attended Jewish day schools, or whose children go to
Jewish day schools, in the US and UK also answered affirmatively; others
in the UK and Australia were encouraged to participate in projects like the
Duke of Edinburgh’s youth achievement award project.
Then I realized it doesn’t stop after high school: Most Israeli teens
are drafted into the IDF. Many others volunteer for a form of civilian
service instead. It’s not rare to meet a young Israeli who did some kind
of voluntary gap-year project before or after military service. And the
peculiarly Israeli form of reserve military duty (miluim) means that many
men (and some women) carry on giving for decades, even when the going
gets very tough.
Israelis intuitively know, however, that hard times such as war and waves
of terrorism bring us together and encourage people to be nicer. It’s our
perversity in adversity, making us stronger the more our enemies attack us.
For the fourth year running, the annual World Happiness Report
published on March 21 by the UN Sustainable Development Solutions
Network ranked Israel as the 11th-happiest country in the world in 2017.
Prepared by the network and the Earth Institute at Columbia University,
the report ranks 155 countries by happiness levels, using variables such
as GDP per capita and healthy life expectancy, as well as social support,
generosity, freedom to make life choices and perceived absence of
corruption. This year’s top 10 countries are Norway, Denmark, Iceland,
Switzerland, Finland, the Netherlands, Canada, New Zealand, Australia
and Sweden. If it weren’t for the perceived corruption clause, Israel could
probably make it into the top 10. It’s something to aim for. The current
ranking, no mean achievement, seems to stem from the longevity and
social togetherness. Perfect strangers love to help in emergencies.
The Ted Arison Family Foundation presents its worldview as rooted in
three Jewish values: charity, acts of loving-kindness and tikkun olam
(repairing the world). But obviously you don’t have to be Jewish to share
these values.
Any day can be a Good Deeds Day and tikkun olam can begin at home, as
a way of life. My good deed for the day? Sharing the good news.
ISRAEL