Letters to the Editor July 25, 2021: From Ben & Jerry's to 'woke culture'

Regarding “19-year-old Avishag Semberg wins bronze in taekwondo” (July 25), my eyes were brimming with tears of pride and happiness watching Semberg compete and hearing her speak. Such grace and modesty and strength of character and will. 

I thank her and all of Israel’s athletes for representing our country so well. I wish success to them all, but no matter what, they are all gold medalists to me.

They should all enjoy some Ben & Jerry’s from brave franchise holder Avi Zinger when they get home.

I want to compliment all those responsible at The Jerusalem Post for the outstanding, beautifully illustrated and informative magazine “Tokyo: Here We Come.”

 

I wish all the athletes the best of luck. Be well and do your best.

In “Orthodox Jews have the best sex” (July 20), Shmuley Boteach writes that “Jews have almost no rules about sex” and that “every pleasurable position is allowed.” The rules on sex in Orthodoxy are not that simplistic.

In the Shulchan Aruch (Orach Chayim, Chapter 240), the repository of Jewish laws codified 500 years ago by Sephardi Rabbi Yosef Karo, which Orthodox Jews follow, the author is very stringent on the when, where, how and why of sexual intercourse. It is forbidden during daytime unless the room is dark. Only the missionary position is allowed. A man should not perform the act while sitting or standing, nor when hungry or full. He should neither prolong the act nor overdo it. He should not focus on his pleasure, but to discharge his obligation of marital relations and to bring forth children who observe the Torah. There are other strict rules which are not appropriate to mention in a family newspaper. 

Similarly, Maimonides (Laws on Forbidden Relations, Chapter 21) states that sex is forbidden during the day or when a candle is burning. And a man is praiseworthy who minimizes sex.

In the Shulchan Aruch (Even HaEzer, Chapter 25), there is a gloss by Remah, whose rulings are followed by Ashkenazi Jews. He writes that all is permissible with one’s wife, reflecting a Talmudic statement (Nedarim 20b). However, if one peruses the writings of contemporary haredi rabbis, they adopt strict rules.

Sherwin Pomerantz’s op-ed “Don’t buy Ben & Jerry’s” (July 21) urging us to “stop buying Ben & Jerry’s wherever they are sold in Israel” will actually hurt the very person who opposed Unilever’s plan to stop selling the products in Yehuda and Shomron. The Israeli licensee who manufactures and distributes Ben & Jerry’s refused Unilever’s request that he stop distributing the product in the “occupied territories, and for that reason his license will not be renewed at the end of 2022. Our not buying his ice cream products now, when he still is able to sell them throughout Israel, hurts the very person we should be championing, not Unilever. 

Boycott Ben and Jerry’s internationally, but please support the current licensee of the products until his contract expires at the end of 2022!

Surely the time has come for Israel to start a new campaign, the abbreviated name of which will be BBDSS, the acronym of “Boycott BDS Supporters.” 

The first target will be Ben & Jerry’s ice cream – but only overseas until their local contract runs out.

We and our allies should always be prepared to “unileverage” our buying power against racist forces unjustly trying to harm us.

Ben and Jerry were two men who made ice cream in Vermont long ago. Today’s owners are taking themselves seriously and have decided to display their ignorance for all the world to see.

To begin with, under international law, there is no “Israeli-occupied West Bank.” It is Judea and Samaria, an integral part of Israeli until such time as Israel decides to give part of it the Palestinian Authority. (See Article 80 of the UN charter.)

The disputed territories were captured by Transjordan in the 1948-49 war to “drive the Jews into the sea.” Every Jew was killed or forced out. Synagogues were destroyed. Desecrated Jewish tombstones became building material for latrines. Jewish properties were given to Arab squatters.

In 1967, Jordan attacked Israel again. This time they lost and Jews started to move back into the territories and homes they were thrown out of.

In 1993, Israel and the PLO signed the Oslo Accords, allowing the PLO to set up headquarters in Ramallah and start the process for a permanent two-state solution. The PLO would control areas A and B and Israel would control area C until final arrangements could be made.

The PLO, which had projected their cause onto the world’s stage via terror (airline hijackings, bombings, Olympic murders, etc.) did not change their modus operandi. Instead of removing the clause in their charter that calls for killing every Israeli Jew, they promoted terrorism and added suicide bombers to their bag of tricks. Israel’s security barrier was built as a result.

So, B & J, don’t sell your ice cream in the disputed territories. I’m sure you will soon fail in the rest of Israel too. But you have made your point: you are fools and/or antisemitic.

Regarding “Screaming about ice cream” (July 23), once the dust settled and the initial shock of Ben and Jerry’s capitulation to the BDS movement calmed down, we came to understand the relation between the ice cream company’s operation in Israel with the home company in Vermont. Avi Zinger and his Israel-based personnel are, in fact, innocent bystanders and have nothing to do with the sordid announcement reverberating throughout the world. Is, however, the B&J’s running out of Be’er Tuviya as “standalone” as we’re being led to believe?

I’m no expert in licensing arrangements or franchise agreements, but I’ve no doubt that some of the NIS 15 or NIS 20 dished out for a container of B&J’s ice cream ultimately winds up in the parent company’s coffers. So, the call for unwavering support for Mr. Zinger during this transitional period may be somewhat hasty since the purchase of the B&J’s product here, in essence, contributes to the support of the branding and corporate well-being of the company at the root level.

It would be better for Zinger to return the B&J’s license and ensure that Fudge Brownie (my favorite, by the way) will no longer be available in Israel regardless of the green line. Surely Zinger has the know-how and experience to create his own brand of ice cream. I’d like to think that Finance Minister Avigdor Liberman would enthusiastically help Zinger obtain the required financial backing to get this new enterprise underway. And while there are some very fine ice cream products currently available in Israeli supermarkets and shopping malls, B&J’s, at least, would not be among the viable competitors. 

This saga is far from over. Legal ramifications of the boycott are already being looked into, and it’s only a matter of time before the Evangelical movement takes steps to keep B&J’s line of treats out of the institutions associated with the movement. The melting point, in other words, has not yet been reached.

Herb Keinon is right when he says that this event will be a strong indicator of how BDS will fare from this point on. Which is precisely why aggressive, decisive action must be taken against B&J’s bullying now, not in a year and a half. 

Many voices have been raised in shock at Ben and Jerry’s decision to not sell their ice cream in (parts of) Israel.

Voices that should have been raised, however, would be to describe the cruelties (and there are many) inherent in the dairy industry.

Milk does not magically and humanely appear like manna from the skies.

Cows are impregnated on tape racks (yes, this is the industry term), and their babies forcibly taken from them so that humans can have the milk/ice cream meant for their calves.

Mothers and babies cry out for days for each other while the babies are being tortured in veal crates.

Many people who have given up veal still support the abuses by not giving up dairy; these two industries are just different sides of the same coin.

So humane Israelis should instead be rejoicing about Ben & Jerry’s decision, and be opting to switch to one of the plethora of plant-based ice cream alternatives.

Humane ice “cream” tastes so sweet.

“Kahana sets out reforms to abolish kashrut monopoly” (July 21) requires a response on several levels. 

Any framework that is based on Halacha or law is to some extent monopolistic. Why not break the monopoly of the Supreme Court and create different frameworks from which one can choose where and how to be judged? 

As the chief rabbi of Dimona for 40 years, I know that the main reason for these reforms is to undermine kashrut. When I tell a kashrut client about various kashrut and halachic standards, the response of those who want to do otherwise is, “We don’t need you – we will turn to Tzohar.” The idea that on one hand the chief rabbinate will set the standards while saying that any three rabbis can make different standards without the approval of the chief rabbinate shows the absurdity of the situation. 

The idea that any rabbi can give a hechsher anywhere shows the real intent of this reform. Why can’t anyone select who will be his judge, policeman, and so on? There is a need for certain improvements in the kashrut system – especially regarding various aspects of the work and payment of the mashgiach – and that should be done within the existing frameworks of the chief rabbinate and the Religious Affairs Ministry. 

Somebody said to me today that I should open a kashrut organization and give hechsharim all over the country according to these reforms and thus be able to marry off all my grandchildren. If the issue weren’t so serious, I would also laugh.

Regarding “Israel critics comprise UNHRC’s permanent war-crimes probe,” Lahav Harkov, July 22

“International jurist Navi Pillay has been tapped to head the United Nations Human Rights Council’s permanent three-person probe into alleged Israeli war crimes.”

This is the same Pillay who in 2014 suggested that Israel should be sharing its Iron Dome defensive technology with Hamas, the very terror group that was launching rockets at Israeli civilians.

This was not a joke. Navi Pillay was serious. The UN has become a bad joke.

Regarding “Coming apart at the seams: The darkest data from the Pew Report” (July 18), in keeping with the sainted Rav Kook, all branches of Judaism should maintain connection and discourse. All Jews are precious and there is no room for sinat chinam (baseless hatred) among fellow Jews. 

But I respectfully disagree that indifference leads to or is sinat chinam. Hatred is so much stronger an emotion than simple indifference. Talking “with” each other rather than “at” each other works both ways. 

One line hits the nail on the head: “We believe that our Jewish heritage has no single correct embodiment.” With all due respect, that’s where we Orthodox differ with the Reform and Conservative streams of Judaism. We believe that there is a single correct embodiment to Judaism, and that is our Torah given to us by God at Mt. Sinai. We believe that our precious Torah is the word of God, not of man, and therefore infallible. The Torah is the basis for all of Western civilization. People are mistaken when they speak of a Judeo-Christian culture. It is Judeo. 

The darkest data from a Pew Report was issued a number of years back when a poll taken by them revealed that a full 70% of all Jewish marriages in America are intermarriages. To me that signifies that there is no future to American Jewry aside from the Orthodox Jews there, who for the most part do not intermarry. 

The Reform and Conservative movements in America and elsewhere are dying because of the intermarriage that they promote. These movements are the ones suffering from indifference – the indifference of their members who see no spark of religion in their services at their cathedral-like temples, which is why they welcome the non-Jewish spouse and their non-Jewish children to fill up the vacant seats. 

And they want to import this so-called Jewish culture to Israel?

No thanks... 

“AOC: Agent of chaos” (July 25) is very interesting and full of details. However sometimes the details can obscure the larger picture.

The bottom line is the “powerful” versus the “powerless.” Israel, being an organized law-abiding democracy, is viewed as “powerful,” while the corrupt Hamas theocracy and the Abbas’s dictatorship are portrayed as “powerless” So the “powerless” are good and the “powerful” are bad. But this same philosophy justifies “defund the police” because the police are “powerful” and the criminals are “powerless.”

We see where all these anarchist theories lead in California, where people sell their homes and move out of a state that does not protect them, where shop owners leave a state that does not prosecute shoplifters and thieves! This will lead to the state of California’s bankruptcy. 

Americans should start opening their eyes to the big picture!

Regarding “It’s bad for Israel when the US has a dim view of itself” (July 23), if there was any question that Antony Blinken is unqualified to serve as US Secretary of State following his egregious performance at the Alaska summit with China, the issue has been resolved beyond doubt. In January, Blinken’s response to the Chinese tirade against the US was his counterproductive concession that the US, “acknowledges our imperfections, acknowledges that we’re not perfect, we make mistakes, we have reversals, we take steps back.” 

Now Blinken has demonstrated once again his inability or unwillingness to defend the US against its detractors by inviting the UN to investigate racism in America. That this investigation would be carried out by the international organization that includes some of the world’s most oppressive countries on its ironically named Human Rights Council makes this nothing more than a sick joke.

Blinken seems to care little about human rights violations by countries such as Venezuela, North Korea, Afghanistan and Pakistan. Further, he must know that enemies of the US, including Russia, China and Iran, will see his misguided attempt at expiation for what it is – a demonstration of American weakness. They will be eager to utilize this unwarranted national self-flagellation as they seek to denigrate America in the eyes of the world. 

Here are two possible explanations for Blinken’s actions: Either, he is convinced that the US is fundamentally racist and must atone for its sins, but does not recognize or care that, in the process, he is seriously damaging the world’s greatest defender of freedom – or, he does not believe his own criticisms of America, but is willing to pay obeisance to the woke mob and the newly controlling Left wing of the Democratic Party. 

Whether he is simply a useful idiot or an intentional co-conspirator in the downfall of the US, the path is clear. Blinken should be replaced before he does even more harm to the country he so ineptly represents.