Netanyahu Government Suggests Israelis Avoid Marrying American Jews

[brooklynite]

Source: The Atlantic

The Netanyahu government's Ministry of Immigrant Absorption is sponsoring advertisements in at least five American communities that warn Israeli expatriates that they will lose their identities if they don't return home.

The Ministry is also featuring on its website a series of short videos that, in an almost comically heavy-handed way, caution Israelis against raising their children in America -- one scare-ad shows a pair of Israeli grandparents seated before a menorah and Skypeing with their granddaughter, who lives in America. When they ask the child to name the holiday they're celebrating, she says "Christmas." In another ad, an actor playing a slightly-adenoidal, goateed young man (who, to my expert Semitic eye, is meant to represent a typical young American Jew) is shown to be oblivious to the fact that his Israeli girlfriend is in mourning on Yom HaZikaron, Israel's memorial day. The Jewish Channel, which broke the story of what it calls a "semi-covert national campaign," suggests that the Ministry does not differentiate between the "dangers" of marrying American Jews, and American non-Jews, and I have to agree. But let's lay that aside for a minute and watch the video:

...snip...

These government-sponsored ads suggest that it is impossible for Jews to remain Jewish in America. How else are we supposed to understand the "Christmas" ad? Obviously, assimilation and intermarriage are issues in America in ways they aren't in Israel. Israel has other problems of course, such as the fact that many of its rabbis act like Iranian mullahs. (I'm not even going to try to unpack my complicated beliefs about intermarriage and assimilation and life in the Diaspora here; that's for a book. But let me just say that intermarriage can also be understood as an opportunity.)

The idea, communicated in these ads, that America is no place for a proper Jew, and that a Jew who is concerned about the Jewish future should live in Israel, is archaic, and also chutzpadik (if you don't mind me resorting to the vernacular). The message is: Dear American Jews, thank you for lobbying for American defense aid (and what a great show you put on at the AIPAC convention every year!) but, please, stay away from our sons and daughters.

Read more: http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2011/11/netanyahu-government-suggests-israelis-avoid-marrying-american-jews/249166/

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...but keep sending those foreign aid checks, or Jesus will never return.

[fascisthunter]

1. another religious extremist

a real nutcase... the damage and divisiveness religious extremist create around the World.... enough is enough!

[formercia]

2. Too good for Goyim. n/t

[bikebloke]

3. And trying to keep them from leaving.

When I lived in Israel, Israelis were marrying americans, Europeans and Australians in order to leave Israel.

[ooglymoogly]

4. Zealotry is for fools who do not have a soul.....

using religion, like a broken record, to prove they do, willing to kill anyone who does not believe them or who casts any doubt.

[dtexdem]

5. Next will come the Netanyahu Nuremburg Laws ..

outlawing such marriages.

[MarkCharles]

6. Please cross-post this in the Religion/Theology forum?

Just asking. Don't know if maybe you'd get more discussion there. Or leave it up the to moderators to decide?

Thanks for posting this here.

[Mosby]

7. You really think this deserves to be in LBN?

:rofl:

[La Lioness Priyanka]

8. lol

[PoliticAverse]

9. It's the war on Chanukah ! n/t

[Response]

10. How theocratic of them.

Are they going to try and give Iran a run for its money?

[TruthBeTold65]

11. Something religious people have yet to learn...

...you cannot control nature...humans, just like other animals, will be attracted to whomever they please...irrespective of your religion, your books, your heavy-handed edicts, your fatwas or whatever other medium you use to control people.

[pettypace]

12. How is this 'breaking news' again?

And one of the sharpest anti-semetic posts to date on DU.

Good grief.

[Shipwack]

13. No, not anti-semetic....

It is not anti-semetic to criticize the government of Israel, especially when you are reporting a true fact. Their government is made up of human beings, which makes it as fallible as any other.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

14. lol

[ZombieHorde]

16. I wish critical thinking was taught in high school. nt

[Poll_Blind]

15. It's tough to come up with a better example of how entitled the Israeli government is.

Harsh. They'll take our money while giving the finger to us, our culture and even American Jews, themselves.

As an ex-girlfriend used to say "Well, shit the bed!"

PB

[applegrove]

17. He's trying to create anxiety amongst America jews. Anxiety that will make them

bend to his radical agenda. Creep.