Many of us have been angry at Fox News for years for their constant comparisons between liberals and Nazis, a completely irresponsiible and stupid comparison...not to mention DEEPLY offensive to Jews and other groups who were targeted by Nazi genocide.

Now some of the top rabbis in America are finally fed up with Fox News and its offensive trivialization of the Holocaust. From the Washington Post:

A coalition of rabbis wants Fox News chief Roger Ailes and conservative host Glenn Beck to cut out all their talk about Nazis and the Holocaust...

The ad is signed by the heads of the Reform, Conservative and Reconstructionist movements as well as Orthodox rabbis.

"We share a belief that the Holocaust, of course, can and should be discussed appropriately in the media. But that is not what we have seen at Fox News," says the ad, signed by hundreds of rabbis and placed by the Jewish Funds for Justice, a nonprofit advocacy group. Earlier this month, the group organized a letter-writing campaign asking Murdoch to remove Beck from the air.  read more »

This is a cool upcoming event on Friday, January 14th at 7 PM in Park Slope, Brooklyn (particularly given the levels of intolerance and hate speech in America today):

On the Friday night before Martin Luther King Jr. Day, we will see how Jewish values and international human rights standards grapple with issues of discrimination and tolerance in a diverse society and, in particular look at our obligations as a Jewish community to address Islamophobia.

There will be a slightly shortened Friday night service led by Rabbi Bachman and Noah Aronson, joined by a special inter-generational CBE choir. Following straight on from this there will be food and a panel discussion with Daisy Khan from the American Society for Muslim Advancement, Iain Levine from Human Rights Watch and Rabbi Bachman. The panel will be moderated by Lisa Miller, the Religion Editor at Newsweek.

Please come and join us for this exciting event. For further information and to RSVP please contact Isabel Burton at 718-768-3814 ext. 243 or iburton@cbebk.org

There's a dearth of Chanukah songs compared to the sheer volume of Christmas music, although much more exists, both sacred and secular than "Maoz Tzur" (Rock of Ages, traditionally sung after candle lighting during all eight days and describes the miracles saving Jews from Egyptian slavery, the Babylonian exile, Persian genocide attempts and Greek oppression), "Dreidel, Dreidel, Dreidel" and Adam Sandler (Here's a link to what I hope will become a classic for Hassidic Reggae star Matisyahu http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gv-7WdpB72o). Ironically, Jews such as Irving Berlin ("White Christmas"), wrote some of the best known Christmas songs.

One of the most ubiquitous holiday songs is the "12 Days of Christmas" AKA "A Partridge in a Pear Tree". The song as been spoofed countless times, including some attempts at producing "Eight Days of Chanukah" (Chanukah is an eight day festival) songs sung to the 12 Days tune. Here's my version.

As I recently wrote, I will soon be visiting an area of Germany once known as Hesse-Darmstadt where my ancestors on my father's side came from.

By sheer co-incidence, while doing web searches about other subjects, I came across a website from the Technical University of Darmstadt with virtual reconstructions of Jewish synagogues that had been destroyed by the Nazis in 1938. This is particularly appropriate since today is Yom Ha Shoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day). From their website:

Since 1995 synagogues that were destroyed by the Nazis in 1938 have been reconstructed on the computer in the Department CAD in Architecture at the Technical University of Darmstadt. The project stems from a student initiative in 1994, a year in which hostility towards foreigners and anti-Semitic commentaries noticeably increased. It was also the year of the arson attack on the synagogue in Lübeck.  read more »

On Columbus day and Thanksgiving, I often discuss the ambivalent nature of these holidays. Both represent the opening of the Americas to European colonization. This led both to the creation of opportunities that would not have been there otherwise. The example I always use is the fact that had the US not been founded, my family would undoubtedly been killed in Europe during the waves of anti-Semitic violence between 1900 and 1945. The events celebrated by Columbus Day and Thanksgiving day unquestionably saved my family. Of course those same events led to the extermination of many Native American families as well. Hence the ambivalent nature of these holidays.

Among the articles I have written on this subject are:

All we take for granted has been built on genocide

Columbus Day Through the Eyes of Native American Democrats

Columbus Day

And on a related note: America Before Columbus: 1421 and 1491

This year I have some different thoughts on Columbus Day, ones that link directly to the saving of families persecuted in Europe. What gets ignored in the celebrations of Columbus Day (which either are overtly pro-colonialism and/or oddly a reflection of Italian Nationalism) is the interesting story of Columbus himself and his family.  read more »