By M.J. Rosenberg
December 16, 2005
Last week's IPF Friday on the "War on Christmas" hit a chord with many readers. I am clearly not the only Jew who feels that attacks on "secular liberals" and "Hollywood types" who happen to be Jewish sometimes borders on anti-Semitism.
On the other hand, I was surprised to read the reactions of those Jews who believe that that because the far right is ostensibly pro-Israel, its views on promoting a Christian America are acceptable.
A typical response appeared in the Jerusalem Post (which ran my piece as an op-ed). It read, "The only friends we have are evangelicals. Why can't they protest against watering down their religion? O' Reilly, Hannity, Coulter etc are friends of Israel." One person e-mailed me to say that "we Jews need to stop biting the hands that feed us. Let them have Christmas so long as they support Israel."
Of course, as I pointed out last week, no Jews favor taking away Christmas. The whole point of the column was that there is no "war against Christmas" and that those commentators who argue that wishing someone "Happy Holidays" rather than "Merry Christmas" threatens the Christian faith are simply creating controversy where there is none.
Judaism has survived as the faith of a tiny minority for thousands of years. Arguing that Christianity is threatened by non-Christians wishing each other "Happy Holidays" in a country that is 90% Christian is pretty insulting to a faith with over two billion adherents worldwide.
I cannot help but conclude that some of those who invented this phony conflict want to establish an explicitly Christian America, one in which Jews, among others, would be a tolerated minority.
It's hard to imagine any Jew signing on to that agenda.
But some Jewish conservatives do and have joined the attack on President Bush -- as well as on Costco, Target and other wholesalers who are sensitive to the feelings of non-Christians at this time of year.
The concept of Jews taking positions hostile to the Jewish people in order to stay faithful to some political agenda is not an especially new phenomenon. Jews on the left have often gone along with stands hostile to Jews, Judaism and Israel to avoid being out of step with their political allies.
In fact, the very first article I ever had published, in New York's left-wing "Village Voice," was an attack on leftist Jews who were, like me, opposed to the Vietnam War but, unlike me, supported the left?s agenda on everything, including Israel.
"These are our Uncle Toms," I wrote "And our shame."
I even coined a name for them. "Let's Call Them Uncle Jakes," I wrote. (I chose the name Uncle Jake because, in 1969, Jake was a stereotypically uncool Jewish name. That was before a studly character on the hit show Melrose Place in the 1990's was called "Jake Hansen" and well before a Jewish actor named Jake Gyllenhaal became the hottest young star around. Nowadays Jake is a cool name for kids, Jewish and not).
Most of today's "Uncle Jakes" are on the right.
This first became apparent when Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" came out in 2003. When Abraham Foxman, head of the Anti-Defamation League, spoke of his worry that the film had the "potential to "to fuel and legitimize anti-Semitism," some Jewish right-wingers criticized not Gibson for making a film that blamed the Jewish people for the death of Christ but Foxman for complaining about it.
Dennis Prager, a Los Angeles radio commentator, wrote that "many Jewish groups and media people now attacking 'The Passion' have a history of irresponsibly labeling conservative Christians anti-Semitic." Take that, Foxman!
Not that Foxman backed down. This month he attacked the Christian Right for ?open arrogance. The arrogance comes when you believe you have the exclusive truth. And it comes if you believe God has commissioned you to change this country.?
Prager criticizes Jews for not "spreading Judeo-Christian values." Some do, he wrote, "but most, religious and secular, [do] not?.. Most Jews are still running away from their divine mission and causing storms in many places as a result."
I don't know which storms Prager is talking about but it is odd that a self-proclaimed observant Jew is labeling other Jews trouble-makers. It's an age old charge (remember the segregationists in the 1960?s who attacked Jewish civil rights workers as ?outside agitators?) but one that has, until now, rarely come from Jews.
Right-wing Jews, have not only endorsed the right?s view on Christmas, they have signed on the dotted line to endorse the entire Christian Right agenda: opposing abortion, poverty programs, progressive taxation, laws that protect gays, affirmative action, the environmental movement, and feminism. The list goes on and on and will be added to each time the Christian Right comes up with a new issue (like Terry Schiavo) to use as a wedge for dividing Americans from each other.
Like the American leftists of old, Prager follows the right-wing line to the letter, as do his other Jewish colleagues on the right, most notably Rabbi Daniel Lapin, the intellectual father of Jewish right-wing politics. Last year Lapin attacked both Howard Stern and the Jews associated with the film "Meet The Fockers" for "debasing" American culture. ?You?d have to be a recent immigrant from Outer Mongolia not to know of the role that people with Jewish names play in the coarsening of our culture. Almost every American knows this. It is just that most gentiles are too polite to mention it.?
According to the Washington Post, Lapin ?then quoted a section of Mein Kampf in which Hitler denounces the 'horrible trash' produced by Jewish entertainers in Weimar Germany. ?Hitler was an 'evil megalomaniac,? Lapin said, but what he was saying was "obvious and inescapable." Hitler!
What is going on here?
Prager himself gives part of the answer when he says that, for Jews, "the one issue that overwhelms all others is the security of Israel." For Prager, it's simple. The Christian Right supports an uncompromising hard-line on Israel and despises the Palestinians; therefore Jews should support the Christian Right.
He conveniently ignores the fact that Christian Right support for Israel is largely based on a religious belief that Christ will only return after Jews are all in Israel accepting the divinity of Jesus Christ.
Mark Pelavin, Associate Director of the Reform movement's Religious Action Center, describes that position this way. "For many evangelicals, support for Israel is rooted in an apocalyptic theology that says that the Messiah will return only after all the Jews have returned to Israel, and those who are not "saved" will be eternally damned. ?. I compare [that] to a five-act play in which all the Jews are killed in act four."
Prager and others like him support an agenda that is dangerous to Jews simply to ingratiate themselves with supposed allies on Israel. Any doubt on that score disappears when one notes that one of the founding members of "Jews Against Anti-Christian Defamation" is Morton Klein, President of the Zionist Organization of America and a consistent opponent of Israeli moves to achieve peace with the Palestinians. Klein, like Jackie Mason and Dennis Prager, no doubt cares very little about Christmas, one way or another. He is, almost surely, motivated by his desire to stay on the good side of those who agree with his opposition to Sharon's Gaza withdrawal and any further Israeli peace moves.
These people remind me of those American Jewish Communists of the 1930's who were so careful about not deviating from the party "line" that they defended the Stalin?s non-aggression pact with Hitler.
It's a sad spectacle. In America in 2005, Jews ought to feel secure enough about their place in this country that they do not have to scrape and bow to people who are fundamentally hostile to the American inclusiveness in which we have thrived. Similarly, it ill-behooves Jews who live in this country, and who benefit from the blessings of living here, to support policies which are bad for America simply because their proponents "support" Israel?s retention of the West Bank.
Prager and company would, I suppose, have us all out there door knocking to elect the likes of Tom DeLay a staunch defender of Greater Israel and an opponent of virtually everything American Jews hold dear. That won?t happen. Not now. Not ever.
A little Jewish pride is in order.
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