Rachel Corrie and the Enduring Fight for Freedom

We're nearly 50 days into Trump's new 'Golden Age,' and yet, somehow, a large-scale war in the Middle East seems more likely now than at any other time since 2003. The obedient 47th President is determined to perform every trick that Benjamin Netanyahu and Miriam Adelson demand of him, regardless of whether or not their particular interests overlap with those of American citizens. Since reclaiming the presidency in January, Trump has delivered a total of $12 billion in military aid to Israel, invoking "emergency authorities" to bypass Congress and ensure Israel receives the 2,000-pound bombs and Caterpillar D9 armored bulldozers that the Biden administration had previously withheld. Indeed, Trump has already vowed to "send Israel everything it needs to finish the job" and the White House has come out publicly and expressed its support for Israel's illegal blockade of all goods and supplies into the Gaza Strip, a territory which has been utterly destroyed, leaving thousands dead and the survivors without resources like food, water and medicine.

Objective observers of the political scene are beginning to notice that America's foreign policy is, to a large degree, formed and directed by influential Jewish groups whose first allegiance is to the state of Israel. 

Just hours before Trump's address to a joint session of Congress on March 4, a letter was issued by the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA) calling for increased American support for Israel's war agenda in the Middle East. Signed by 77 former U.S. generals who agree it's "time to let Israel finish the job against the Iranian axis," the letter calls on the American government to maximize support for Israel in any forthcoming operations against the Persian state. FoxNews.com reports: 

"The retired generals and admirals are calling on the U.S. to provide Israel with munitions, weapons systems and 'support needed to ensure the effectiveness of its operations against this common threat.' They assert that by supporting Israel in its fight against a nuclear Iran, the U.S. would be protecting its own influence in the region. The Iranian regime was also recently accused of plotting to assassinate Trump, which the president said would lead to the Islamic Republic being 'obliterated.'"

JINSA is an extremely hawkish foreign policy think-tank dedicated to forging inseparable ties between Israel and America's defense establishment. Formerly known as the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs, the group was founded, according to The Nation's Jason Vest, by "neoconservatives concerned that the United States might not be able to provide Israel with adequate military supplies in the event of another Arab-Israeli war." Influential members of JINSA, like Douglas Feith and Richard Perle, played significant roles in fomenting the catastrophic invasion of Iraq in 2003 by fabricating the outlandish WMD disinformation used as justification for deploying American troops. Twenty-two years later and the same group is at it again, applying maximum pressure to an obviously compromised Donald Trump in the hope that he'll activate the U.S. military for yet another series of costly wars in the Middle East. It's no coincidence that the US Army recently reported its highest recruiting numbers in 15 years, enlisting 10,727 new soldiers in December 2024 alone!

Remembering Rachel Corrie

With the drums of war beating louder with the passing of each day, the Trump administration is working diligently to ensure that any organized opposition to Israel will soon be verboten. On January 29, Trump signed an executive order "to combat anti-Semitism vigorously, using all available and appropriate legal tools, to prosecute, remove, or otherwise hold to account the perpetrators of unlawful anti-Semitic harassment and violence." The order "reaffirms" Executive Order 13899, signed by Trump in December 2019, which expanded Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act to specifically target the nonviolent Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement on college campuses by instructing those tasked with enforcing Title VI to consider the IHRA working definition of anti-Semitism, which happens to include criticism of Israel. To prove he's not bluffing, Trump has organized a Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism, headed by Leo 'Uncle Tom' Terrell, which has already opened investigations into nearly a dozen US colleges. In a move which civil rights groups say is "unprecedented" and "unconstitutional," the Department of Education announced this week it has canceled $400 million in federal funding to Columbia University, citing "relentless violence, intimidation, and anti-Semitic harassment" on campus, while affirming that "additional cancellations are expected to follow."

Ever since the 1960s, America's college campuses have been a hotbed of anti-war activism. For all of their other faults, youthful, energetic Americans of a liberal orientation are often endowed with an intense humanitarian spirit that is naturally averse to genocide and war. It's not uncommon that these people, and not the flag-waving MAGA yahoos, are the ones most willing to stand up to perceived injustices, even at the expense of their own lives.

One such person was Rachel Corrie, who, twenty-two years ago this month, was killed in cold blood by the Israeli army while she protested the destruction of Palestinian homes in Gaza. 

Rachel was raised in Olympia, Washington. While attending Evergreen State College in the early 2000s, she learned about the Israel/Palestine conflict through a friend she met at school of Palestinian origin. Shortly thereafter she became, in her own words, a "committed peace activist," determined to do something about the grave injustice she rightly perceived as a humanitarian disaster. Rachel first linked up with a group called 'Olympians for Peace and Solidarity,' organizing peace events to help raise awareness of the Palestinians' plight, before joining the International Solidarity Movement (ISM). The ISM is a pro-Palestine organization founded in 2001 by Palestinian, American, and Israeli activists following the rejection of a United Nations proposal by the United States and Israel that sought to place international human rights monitors in occupied Palestinian territories. Since its inception the mission of the ISM has been to support the Palestinian cause through non-violent direct action initiatives, such as protests against the Israeli military in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. 

In January 2003, Rachel and other members of the ISM journeyed to the West Bank for what they described as a solidarity campaign. The group first stopped off in a town east of Bethlehem called Beit Sahour, before heading to Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. They arrived in Gaza at a time when the Israeli military was engaged in a large-scale campaign of destroying Palestinian homes, oftentimes making use of Caterpillar D9 armored bulldozers paid for by the American taxpayer as their weapon of choice. A 2004 report issued by the United Nations established that between September 2000 and May 2004, 17,594 Palestinians had their homes destroyed by the Israeli army.

While in Rafah, Rachel stayed with a number of families, including a physician named Dr. Samir Nasrallah who lived in a modest two-story home near the Israeli border with his wife and their three children. In an interview conducted shortly before her death, Rachel spoke about some of the horrors she witnessed during her time in Rafah: 

"In the time that I've been here, children have been shot and killed. On the 30th of January the Israeli military bulldozed the two largest water wells destroying over half of Rafah's water supply. Every few days, if not every day, houses are demolished here. People are economically devastated because the closure of the border into Egypt and the extreme control of the Gazan economy by Israel....I feel like what I'm witnessing here is a very systematic destruction of a people's ability to survive. And that is incredibly horrifying."

On March 16, 2003, just four days before the American invasion of Iraq, Rachel received a call from a fellow activist informing her that the IDF were preparing to raze Dr. Nasrallah's home to the ground. "The Israelis are back" the caller said, "Get over here right away. I think they're heading for Dr. Samir's house." Indeed, American-made bulldozers had placed Dr. Nasrallah's home in their sights, after having already destroyed the surrounding structures. "Almost every other structure in the area had been knocked down in recent months; Nasrallah’s abode now stood alone in a sea of sand and debris." [Source]

Rachel arrived at the site and met with a group of seven British and American ISM activists who were carrying bullhorns and wearing orange fluorescent vests for maximum visibility. An article on NPR.org described what happened when she confronted the bulldozer operated by two members of the IDF: 

"Corrie, wearing an orange fluorescent vest and speaking through a bullhorn, was determined to stop them. Standing alone on a mound of earth in the path of the armored vehicle, she expected the Israeli bulldozer approaching her to come to a halt, as other bulldozers had done when faced with international protesters. But it kept going, and, as her fellow activists screamed and tried to stop it, the 23-year-old college student from Olympia, Washington, was crushed to death. The Nasrallah family's children watched in horror through a crack in their garden wall."

 One of the eyewitnesses, a man named Joe Carr, gave the following account: 

"Still wearing her fluorescent jacket, she knelt down at least 15 meters in front of the bulldozer, and began waving her arms and shouting, just as activists had successfully done dozens of times that day....When it got so close that it was moving the earth beneath her, she climbed onto the pile of rubble being pushed by the bulldozer....Her head and upper torso were above the bulldozer's blade, and the bulldozer operator and co-operator could clearly see her. Despite this, the operator continued forward, which caused her to fall back, out of view of the driver. He continued forward, and she tried to scoot back, but was quickly pulled underneath the bulldozer. We ran towards him, and waved our arms and shouted; one activist with the megaphone. But the bulldozer operator continued forward, until Rachel was all the way underneath the central section of the bulldozer."

Despite a promise by Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to launch a "thorough, credible, and transparent" investigation, the military inquiry completely absolved the IDF of any wrongdoing and ruled that Rachel's death was an accident for which she herself was responsible. One witness interviewed by the Israeli military, a British nurse named Alice Coy, testified under oath that the soldier who interviewed her about Rachel's murder refused to even record her statement that she believed the bulldozers were planning to destroy civilian homes. The ruling was criticized by human rights groups Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and B'Tselem, as well as by Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, who told Rachel's parents that he didn't consider the investigation legitimate. Similar sentiments were expressed by the US ambassador to Israel, Dan Shapiro, who told Rachel's family that the US government did not believe the Israeli investigation had been "thorough, credible, and transparent." In spite of the critiques, Congressman Brian Baird, who represented Rachel's hometown of Olympia, Washington, was one of the only American politicians willing to draw attention to her murder. In March 2003, Baird introduced a resolution in the U.S. Congress calling on the U.S. government to "undertake a full, fair, and expeditious investigation" into Rachel's death. Unsurprisingly, no action was ever taken.

In 2005 Rachel's parents filed a civil lawsuit in the Haifa district court accusing the Israeli state of failing to conduct a credible investigation and for bearing ultimate responsibility for Rachel's death. The family sued for a symbolic $1 dollar, not seeking financial gain, but rather accountability for the death of their loved one. In August 2012, an Israeli court upheld the verdict of the military investigation, invoking a "combat activities" exception which states that military personnel cannot be held accountable for any physical or economic harm done to civilians in an area designated as a 'war zone.' In his verdict, Judge Oded Gershon described Israel's investigation as "appropriate" and accused Rachel and others in the ISM of 'protecting terrorists,' although Dr. Nasrallah and his family could hardly be said to fit that description. Gershon added that Rachel's death was "the result of an accident she brought upon herself." Following the trial, Corrie's family alleged that important evidence was withheld as part of an ongoing coverup. As reported by the Jerusalem Post: "Immediately after the trial ended in July, Corrie's family alleged that important evidence -- including several surveillance tapes that show color footage of events before and after the activist's death -- were withheld as part of a cover-up over the circumstances of her death. The color footage was used in a Channel 2 documentary, but the IDF has denied that it exists, the family claims."

On the basis of this withheld evidence, Mr. and Mrs. Corrie filed an appeal against the ruling in May 2014 which was ultimately rejected by the Israeli Supreme Court the following year. Today, Craig and Cindy Corrie continue to fight for Palestinian rights, founding the Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice in 2003 to 'support grassroots efforts for peace and justice globally.' (Steven Plaut, a former columnist for New York-based newspaper The Jewish Press, once described Mr. and Mrs. Corrie as a "two-person anti-Israel propaganda SWAT team.")

The real struggle Americans face is not one between Democrats and Republicans, regardless of what the Alex Joneses of the world might contend. When human consciousness is captured by political parties -- as has happened to a large extent since 2016 -- people will frequently be found defending their worst adversaries due to the dictates of 'the party.' Many Americans imagine Donald Trump to be some kind of a Superhero engaged in a valiant struggle to save America and the Western world from a nameless, faceless globalist cabal. In reality, Trump is a belligerent oaf who seems hell-bent on driving the final nail into America's coffin by being a dutiful Step-and-Fetch for Netanyahu and the state of Israel. In a country full of chest-thumping MAGA Neanderthals, we need more people with the integrity of Rachel Corrie. Only with similar conviction and resolve can we ever hope to see the day that American sovereignty is restored and our nation once again perceived as a light unto the world. May God bless her memory!

The Art of Deception

In his 1987 book The Art of the Deal, Donald Trump describes a stunt he pulled a few years earlier that involved deceiving Holiday Inn executives into partnering with him on the construction of a casino. Trump, who owned a strip of land along the Atlantic City boardwalk, lied when he told the hotel chain's top brass that construction was already underway and that encouraging progress was being made. In reality ground had barely been broken at Trump's site which, at that time, was little more than a plot of empty land. On the day the executives were scheduled to appear on-site, Trump "directed his construction manager to hire dozens of pieces of heavy equipment to move dirt around the site, digging holes and filling them back up if necessary." "What the bulldozers and dump trucks did wasn't important...so long as they did a lot of it," Trump said. [Source: Business Insider, Apr. 20, 2017] 

The hoodwink worked as expected, for Trump knew that the mere appearance of activity would be enough to persuade the hotel executives to invest in his project. 

A similar trick is being played on the American people today. 

So far the Trump administration's oft-touted "mass deportations" scheduled to begin on "day one" have yet to materialize. The daily totals through the first few weeks are nowhere near high enough to make even a slight dent in the number of illegals who have entered the US over the last eight years alone. At the current rate it would take 28 years to deport the 11 million people officially claimed to be in the country illegally, and Trump's daily deportation total would have to hit at least 2,700 to reach even one million per year. In spite of his fervid campaign rhetoric, the highest single day arrest total since Trump took office is just over 1,100 and even that fell to a paltry 300 per day by late last week. NBC News reports: 

"In order to fulfill Trump's Inauguration Day promise of 'millions and millions' of deportations, the Trump administration would have to be deporting over 2,700 immigrants every day to reach 1 million in a year. And...arrests do not always equal immediate detentions, much less deportations. Of the more than 8,000 immigrants arrested in the first two weeks of the Trump administration, 461 were released, according to the White House."

To distract from these lackluster numbers, the blustering border czar Tom Homan is routinely situated in front of television cameras to huff and puff and issue hollow threats to illegals about the imminent crackdown set to begin any day now. The final touch is added when news cameras capture footage of ICE agents in major cities going door-to-door giving the appearance of activity by the new administration, while the actual figures concerning arrests and deportations continue to fall. It seems the deception has been successful enough to satisfy a large portion of the MAGA base, many of whom can rarely be accused of investigating things too deeply.

Juxtaposed with Trump's inability to enforce domestic policies is his considerable efficiency in supporting Israel.

Just over a week after his inauguration -- which, symbolically, was held inside the US Capitol for the benefit of a champagne-sipping crowd of billionaires that included former 'Never Trumpers' Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos and Sergey Brin, while his MAGA base was left out in the cold -- Trump signed an Executive Order to 'Combat Antisemitism in the United States.' The order, which calls on the Department of Justice to prosecute Americans for so-called antisemitism, "takes forceful and unprecedented steps to marshal all Federal resources to combat the explosion of anti-Semitism on our campuses and in our streets" and ominously asserts "It shall be the policy of the United States to combat anti-Semitism vigorously, using all available and appropriate legal tools, to prosecute, remove, or otherwise hold to account the perpetrators of unlawful anti-Semitic harassment and violence." 

Within days of Trump signing the order, five major universities (Columbia, Northwestern, Portland State, University of California, Berkeley, and the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities) were placed under investigation by the Department of Education for allowing "antisemitism" -- i.e., criticism of Israel's genocide -- to flourish on their respective campuses. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took to X to formally thank President Trump, "on behalf of Israel and the Jewish people...for his executive order to fight antisemitism and support for terrorism on American campuses."

On February 4, Trump met with Netanyahu at the White House and was curiously gifted a golden pager by the Israeli leader in what can easily be perceived as a not-too-subtle threat. If so, it would seem that Trump got the message. During his press conference the 47th President reiterated his support for the forceful relocation of the 1.8 million Palestinians living in Gaza (down from 2.2 million in 2023) and added that he would consider deploying US military personnel to the region to assert U.S. sovereignty over the Gaza Strip: 

"The US will take over the Gaza Strip and we will do a job with it too. We'll own it and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous unexploded bombs and other weapons on the site, level the site and get rid of the destroyed buildings, level it out. Create an economic development that will supply unlimited numbers of jobs and housing for the people of the area [Israelis]...do a real job, do something different." 

Trump's statement may have come across to some as just another sensational off-the-cuff remark but, in fact, it's entirely in keeping with previous statements both he and his son-in-law Jared Kushner have made about Gaza being a "phenomenal location" with "very valuable waterfront property," as well as with Netanyahu's "Gaza 2035" initiative.

Three days after meeting with Bibi, Trump broke "a long-standing precedent for congressional review of major weapons sales" by approving a $7.4 billion arms transfer to Israel after Congress halted a proposed $1 billion "arms sale" to the Zionist state that would've been paid for by the U.S. taxpayer. A Feb. 7, 2025 report in Reuters provided some details about the transfer: 

"U.S. President Donald Trump's administration announced on Friday that it had approved military sales to Israel worth some $7.4 billion, despite a Democratic lawmakers' request that the sale be paused until he received more information...The announcement came as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited Washington for meetings with Trump, administration officials and members of Congress. Representative Gregory Meeks...denounced what he termed a decision to break with a long-standing precedent for congressional review of major weapons sales...He said the decision showed a lack of respect for Congress as a co-equal branch of government. 'In the United States we do not have kings -- we are a democracy rooted in the Constitution, governed by laws,' Meeks said." 

The $7.4 billion transfer comes on the heels of Trump's 90-day pause on all foreign aid (with the exception of Israel of course!) and his decision to stop funding the UN's Palestine relief agency UNRWA, both actions resulting in the Palestinian people being unable to receive adequate medical supplies, food deliveries and other vital resources necessary for survival. 

After ensuring Israel was provided the necessary munitions to 'finish the job' in the Middle East, Trump took aim at the international courts that have been a thorn in the side of Netanyahu & Co. since shortly after October 7.

First he signed an executive order cutting aid to South Africa, citing, among other things, the genocide case brought at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) against Israel: 

"In addition, South Africa has taken aggressive positions towards the United States and its allies, including accusing Israel, not Hamas, of genocide in the international court of justice, and reinvigorating its relations with Iran to develop commercial, military and nuclear arrangements." 

He then signed an order imposing economic and travel sanctions on the International Criminal Court (ICC) and its chief prosecutor Karim Khan over the court's decision to issue arrest warrants for Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. The order accuses the ICC of "illegitimate and baseless actions targeting America and our close ally Israel." The ICC is the world's only permanent global tribunal for crimes against humanity, aggression, war crimes and genocide, all of which Bibi and Gallant are patently guilty of carrying out. According to Time.com: "The warrants said there was reason to believe Netanyahu and Gallant used 'starvation as a method of warfare' by restricting humanitarian aid, and intentionally targeted civilians in Israel's campaign against Hamas in Gaza. Israeli officials deny the charges." 

Making a mockery of Israel's denials, Yoav Gallant himself told the media shortly after 10/7: "We are imposing a complete siege on the city of Gaza. There will be no electricity, no food, no water, no fuel, everything is closed. We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly."

Trump's ICC executive order has been condemned in a joint statement by 79 nations including France, Germany, Spain and Brazil, expressing "regret" at "attempts to undermine the court's independence, integrity and impartiality." For his final trick Trump lifted sanctions on 30 of Israel's most extreme settler groups in the West bank, and re-imposed "maximum pressure" sanctions on Iran targeting her oil network which supplies extraordinary amounts of discounted crude to China. 

Trump, like many swindlers, is a showman who manipulates public perception with the virtuosity of someone who has spent years working in television. While millions of MAGA diehards actually believe his actions are motivated by a consideration for the public welfare, the reality is that Trump is first-and-foremost beholden to mega-rich political donors who are always guaranteed a return on their sizeable deposits. It's been reported in the Israeli press, for example, that in return for her donation of $100 million to Trump's presidential campaign, ultra-Zionist Miriam Adelson expects annexation of the West Bank. So too does Israel's extremist Minister of Finance Bezalel Smotrich, who wrote on X after Trump's landslide victory in November, "the year 2025 will, with God's help, be the year of sovereignty in Judea and Samaria," making use, like U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, of the Biblical name for the territory comprising the West Bank. 

If there's one takeaway from Trump's first three weeks in office it's that, in matters of foreign policy at least, it doesn't appear he will do anything other than fulfill his obligations to the wealthy donors who returned him to the White House. Due to his ability to manipulate conservative perceptions, however, it's unlikely there will be any meaningful opposition from his base.

On November 2, 1983, President Ronald Reagan signed a bill enshrining Martin Luther King Jr. Day a federal holiday. Shortly before signing the legislation Reagan received a letter from Republican Governor Meldrim Thomson pleading with him to veto the bill on account of King being "a man of immoral character" who had "well established" communist affiliations. Although sympathetic to Thomson's grievance, Reagan refused to hinder passage of the bill, replying, "On the national holiday you mentioned, I have the reservations you have, but here the perception of too many people is based on an image, not reality. Indeed to them, the perception is reality."

Reagan's insight is as applicable to Donald Trump in 2025 as it was to MLK in 1983. The popular image of Trump as an intrepid adversary of the Deep State holds powerful sway over the minds of many Americans but stands in contrast to the reality of him as a shabbos goy, operating primarily on behalf of his billionaire donors, Netanyahu and the state of Israel. I can think of no other political leader who could shut down the US economy, appoint a clown like Tony Fauci to spearhead a national pandemic response, give $500 billion to Sam Altman and Larry Ellison to produce AI-generated mRNA vaccines, and still receive historic levels of support from conservative Americans. Again, as that other great paragon of conservatism Ronald Reagan said, "the perception of too many people is based on an image, not reality." Few would know better than the former Hollywood actor-turned-politician who, as the 40th president of the United States, granted amnesty to over 3 million illegal aliens without suffering even the slightest damage to his stellar legacy.

Jews Are The Problem

"Hence, no Jew, whether orthodox or not, can conscientiously refrain from cooperating with the rest for the elevation of the entire Jewry." -- Moses Hess, pioneer of Zionism and Communism, The Revival of Israel: Rome and Jerusalem (1862)

Matthew the Apostle records Jesus as teaching that "Every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit." (Matthew 7:17) This is certainly true of Judaism, the 'bad fruits' of which include Zionism, Communism, Feminism, Talmudism, predatory Capitalism, Holocaustianity, pornography and gay marriage, just to name a few. With Israel's "war" entering day 457 at the time of writing, and the Israeli Defense Forces continuing to use American munitions to destroy the last remaining hospitals in Gaza, it has finally become socially acceptable to criticize Benjamin Netanyahu and aspects of his military campaign in the Middle East. Many newfound critics, however, are not inclined to utter a single disparaging word about 'the Jews' or the sacrosanct Jewish religion, despite Netanyahu invoking Amalek to justify slaughtering men, women and children in the region. 

Last week I received an email from an old friend of mine who has been supportive of Israel for as long as I've known him. We worked together for six years beginning in the mid-2000s, and during that time the Israel/Palestine conflict was one of the issues we disagreed most strongly on. Being somewhat of a cementhead whose brain fossilized during the Reagan-Bush era, he was often a difficult guy to have a conversation with, especially if it involved abstract themes. (His response to my contention that 9/11 was an inside job was something to the effect of 'How dare you! A lot of Americans died that day!!') That being said, I was pleasantly surprised to see that his email included a link to a New York Times article titled 'State Dept. Tells Congress It Plans to Send $8 Billion in Arms to Israel.' Below the link was a short comment lamenting the fact that the American government can't even feed and house its own veterans, yet somehow manages to send billions of dollars in foreign aid and military equipment to Israel. 

In my response I thanked him for sending the NYT article and indicated it would be nice to meet up for coffee sometime soon to discuss things further. I informed him that the foreign/military aid America gives to Israel is just the tip of the iceberg and I provided a few links to additional news items that I thought he might find useful, including one to a recent article I wrote called 'The Jewish Stranglehold,' in which I mention that after Hurricane Harvey devastated the city of Dickinson, Texas in 2017, city officials made federal relief funds contingent on support for Israel. Knowing that he fancies himself a true 'America First' patriot, I thought for sure the inflammatory information would dovetail nicely with his newfound skepticism vis-à-vis America's "special relationship" with the Jewish state. Needless to say I was disappointed when he wrote back and reprimanded me for my use of the term 'Jewish Stranglehold,' suggesting that in future articles I might consider replacing 'Jewish' with 'Zionist' to avoid upsetting ordinary Jews who have nothing whatsoever to do with nefarious activities. Like everyone who writes and/or speaks out about Jewish supremacism, I've encountered this suggestion many times before. It's rather typical advice, often furnished by some puffed up know-it-all who recently watched an Abby Martin video and emerged from the experience as an expert on world affairs. 

The problem with my friend's reasoning lies in its imprecision; there are many problematic aspects of Judaism that don't fit neatly under the 'Zionist' canopy. Indeed, oftentimes some of the worst elements of Judaism manifest within ultra-Orthodox sects that wholly reject Zionism and the state of Israel on religious grounds. In fact, Orthodox traditions maintain that the founding of the true state of Israel is not to precede the coming of the Jewish Messiah: "the people were adjured not to return collectively to the Land of Israel by the exertion of physical force, nor to 'rebel against the nations of the world,' nor to 'hasten the End.' In short, they were required to wait for the heavenly, complete, miraculous, supernatural, and meta-historical redemption that is totally distinct from the realm of human endeavor." Ultra-Orthodox opposition to modern Israel doesn't ipso facto render these groups any more saintly than Netanyahu's IDF butchers, however, contrary to what gatekeepers who limit their grievances to Zionism alone might contend. 

The bedrock teachings of Orthodox Judaism are derived from the Babylonian Talmud (aka Torah SheBa'al peh), a collection of rabbinic works described by Wikipedia as "the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary text of Jewish law (halakha) and Jewish theology." The Talmud is divided into two sections: the Mishnah (instruction) and Gemara (completion). The Mishnah is a written collection of Jewish traditions that comprise the Oral Torah, supposedly transmitted by God to Moses on Mount Sinai and orally preserved for roughly 1600 years until it was committed to writing in the third century AD; the Gemara is a compendium of commentaries and debates on the Mishnah. I'm not an expert on world religions but I'd venture to guess that Orthodox Judaism is the only one whose holiest texts contain elaborate debates on the permissibility of sexually abusing children. For example, Talmud tractate Sanhedrin 54b, confirmed by 12th century halakhic authority Moses Maimonides to be correctly interpreted Rabbinic law, states in part:

"[T]he Torah does not deem the intercourse of one who is less than nine years old to be like the intercourse of one who is at least nine years old, as for a male's act of intercourse to have the legal status of full-fledged intercourse the minimum age is nine years. . .Therefore, just as one who engages in intercourse actively is not liable if he is less than nine years old, as the intercourse of such a child does not have the halakhic status of intercourse, so too, if a child who is less than nine years old engages in homosexual intercourse passively, the one who engages in intercourse with him is not liable." 

A similar opinion regarding sexual abuse of young girls was put forth by Rabbi Rava, one of the most frequently cited rabbis in the Talmud, and can be found in tractate Ketubot 11b: "An adult male who engaged in intercourse with a minor girl less than three years old has done nothing, as intercourse with a girl less than three years old is tantamount to poking a finger into the eye. In the case of an eye, after a tear falls from it another tear forms to replace it. Similarly, the ruptured hyman of the girl younger than three is restored."

Debates and meditations like these abound within the sordid pages of the Talmud, and the bizarre relationship between ultra-Orthodox Jews and small children can be seen in the metzitzah b'peh circumcision ritual, which has frequently been responsible for the transmission of herpes, in some cases resulting in the unfortunate infant's death.

In light of all this it's not surprising that the obscure ultra-Orthodox sect Lev Tahor has been in the news recently following accusations of kidnapping, forced marriages and child rape.

Lev Tahor adheres to a strict interpretation of rabbinic law, forcefully opposing the political ideology of Zionism on Talmudic grounds. Although founded in Jerusalem in 1988 by Rabbi Shlomo Helbrans and having a sizeable presence in the Israeli city of Beit Shemash, the group is largely resented within the Jewish state, earning the derogatory designation "The Jewish Taliban." In 1990, Rabbi Helbrans moved the group to the U.S. and four years later he was arrested and imprisoned after being charged with kidnapping a 13-year-old boy. During his incarceration (he served two years of a four year sentence), former members of the group accused Helbrans of sexually abusing a number of children who were in his care, something not at all uncommon within the ranks of Lev Tahor. Upon his release from prison, Helbrans was deported to Israel, and in 2001 he relocated the group to Canada where they stayed until fleeing to Guatemala in 2008 amid accusations of kidnapping, promoting underage marriage and sexual abuse. In 2014, Lev Tahor was expelled from a West Guatemalan village after a "bitter row" with the indigenous community, who "accused the Jews of shunning the villagers and imposing their religion and customs" while "undermining the Catholic faith that was predominant in San Juan La Laguna," according to an August 30, 2014 BBC report. After this incident, members of the group relocated to the Mexican town of Huixtla, where their jungle compound was raided in 2022 by police who arrested twenty Jews, all of whom later escaped from the detention center where they were being held after rioting and assaulting the guards. 

In July 2024, Yoil, Yakov and Shmiel Weingarten, all former leaders of Lev Tahor, were found guilty of kidnapping two children and were sentenced to 12 and 14 years in prison. Five months later, Guatemalan authorities raided Lev Tahor's compound in the town of Oratorio, rescuing 160 children suspected of being victims of abuse. Within days a Jewish mob consisting of 100 Lev Tahor members stormed the "care center" where the children were being held in an unsuccessful attempt to recapture them, slashing the tires of government vehicles and engaging in violent confrontations with police. The latest news came just days ago, when Jonathan Emmanuel Castillo, a leader of Lev Tahor, was arrested in El Salvador on charges of human trafficking, rape and abuse of minors.

Defenders of the synagogue will claim that Lev Tahor is just a fringe cult that in no way represents the sagely Orthodox faith. But if Lev Tahor is an insignificant sect numbering only a few hundred worldwide, the same cannot be said of the ultra-Orthodox group Satmar. 

Founded in Hungary by Rabbi Joel Teitelbaum in 1905, Satmar relocated to Brooklyn, New York following World War II and has since "grown to become one of the largest Hasidic dynasties in the world," exceeding in size even the international political powerhouse Chabad Lubavitch, representatives of which have been hosted at the White House by every president since Jimmy Carter. 

In November 2013, journalist Christopher Ketcham interviewed Rabbi Nuchem Rosenberg, a whistleblower inside the Satmar community, and published his findings in an expose' for Vice magazine carrying the provocative title 'The Child-Rape Assembly Line': 

On a visit to Jerusalem in 2005, Rabbi Rosenberg entered into a mikvah in one of the holiest neighborhoods in the city, Mea She'arim. "I opened the door that entered into a schvitz," he told me. "Vapors everywhere, I can barely see. My eyes adjust, and I see an old man, my age, long white beard, a holy-looking man, sitting in the vapors. On his lap, facing away from him, is a boy, maybe seven years old. And the old man is having anal sex with this boy."..."This boy was speared on the man like an animal, like a pig, and the boy was saying nothing. But on his face - fear. The old man [looked at me] without any fear, as if this was common practice. He didn't stop. I was so angry I confronted him. He removed the boy from his penis, and I took the boy aside. I told this man, 'It's a sin before God...What are you doing to this boy's soul? You're destroying this boy!' He had a sponge on a stick to clean his back, and he hit me across the face with it. 'How dare you interrupt me!' he said. I had heard of these things for a long time, but now I had seen."

The child sex abuse crisis in ultra-Orthodox Judaism, like that in the Catholic Church, has produced its share of shocking headlines in recent years. In New York, and in the prominent Orthodox communities of Israel and London, allegations of child molestation and rape have been rampant. The alleged abusers are schoolteachers, rabbis, fathers, uncles -- figures of male authority. The victims, like those of Catholic priests, are mostly boys. Rabbi Rosenberg believes around half of young males in Brooklyn's Hasidic community -- the largest in the United States and one of the largest in the world -- have been victims of sexual assault perpetrated by their elders. Ben Hirsch, director of Survivors for Justice, a Brooklyn organization that advocates for Orthodox sex abuse victims, thinks the real number is higher. 'From anecdotal evidence, we're looking at over 50 percent. It has almost become a rite of passage.' Ultra-Orthodox Jews who speak out about these abuses are ruined and condemned to exile by their own community. Dr. Amy Neustein, a nonfundamentalist Orthodox Jewish sociologist. . . told me the story of a series of Hasidic mothers in Brooklyn she got to know who complained that their children were being preyed on by their husbands. In these cases, the accused men "very quickly and effectively engage the rabbis, the Orthodox politicians, and powerful Orthodox rabbis who donate handsomely to political clubs." The goal, she told me, is "to excise the mother from the child's life." Rabbinical courts cast the mothers aside, and the effects are permanent. The mother is "amputated." One woman befriended by Dr. Neustein. . .lost contact with all six of her children, including an infant she was breastfeeding at the time of their separation.

Ketcham goes on to describe what happens to whistleblowers like Rabbi Rosenberg, who attempt to beam a light of scrutiny into the perverted precincts of utlra-Orthodox Judaism:

 

When Rabbi Rosenberg wants to bathe at a mikvah in Brooklyn to purify himself, none will have him. When he wants to go to synagogue, none will have him. "He is finished in the community, butchered," said a fellow rabbi who would only talk anonymously. "No one will look at him, and those who will talk to him, they can't let it be known. The pressure in our community, it's incredible."

Orthodox Judaism has strict laws regarding moisers or 'informants,' which forbid a Jew from informing on another Jew, regardless of his transgression. It's not uncommon for a family who reports sexual abuse allegations to the authorities to be shunned by their fellow Judaics. A May 9, 2012 New York Times article titled 'Ultra-Orthodox Shun Their Own for Reporting Child Sexual Abuse,' substantiates Ketcham's reporting while detailing the travails of the Jungreis family, whose mentally defective son was sexually abused by a member of the Jewish community: 

The first shock came when Mordechai Jungreis learned that his mentally disabled teenage son was being molested in a Jewish ritual bathhouse in Brooklyn. The second came after Mr. Jungreis complained, and the man accused of the abuse was arrested. Old friends started walking stonily past him and his family on the streets of Williamsburg. Their landlord kicked them out of their apartment. Anonymous messages filled their answering machine, cursing Mr. Jungries for turning in a fellow Jew. And, he said, the mother of a child in a wheelchair confronted Mr. Jungreis's mother-in-law, saying the same man had molested her son, and she "did not report this crime, so why did your son-in-law have to?". . . Abuse victims and their families have been expelled from religious schools and synagogues, shunned by fellow ultra-Orthodox Jews and targeted for harassment intended to destroy their businesses.

It goes without saying that sick individuals exist in all walks of life, not least of all within the Catholic Church and other Christian sects as well. The difference is, when a Catholic priest or a Protestant pastor molests a child, he is acting against the foundational teachings of his faith, whereas the Talmudic rabbi is acting in accord with his! Although many Jews who wield political power today probably don't read the Talmud or even attend synagogue, they nevertheless seem to possess similar characteristics as those that do (Jeffrey Epstein's unholy circle of friends immediately comes to mind). Ron Unz, in a 2018 article titled 'Oddities of the Jewish Religion,' provided a reasonable explanation for this phenomena: "...it is important to keep in mind that until a few generations ago, almost all European Jews were deeply Orthodox, and even today I would guess that the overwhelming majority of Jewish adults had Orthodox grand-parents. Highly distinctive cultural patterns and social attitudes can easily seep into a wider population, especially one that remains ignorant of the origin of those sentiments..." 

Reverend Ted Pike makes a similar observation in his article 'Pedophilia: The Talmud's Dirty Secret': "Virtually all media moguls who founded Hollywood and the big three TV networks were immigrants, or their children, from predominantly orthodox Jewish communities in Eastern Europe. In the late 19th century, most European Jews were a people of the book. But their book wasn't the Bible. It was the Babylonian Talmud. To this day, the Talmud remains Judaism's highest moral, ethical and legal authority."

I recently read a book titled Jews Are The Problem, written by black activist Ayo Kimathi. The book is relatively short, weighing in at 160 pages in 5.5" X 8.5" format, but it manages to cover a wide range of topics. Although I was familiar with much of the information presented, I found Jews Are The Problem to be an interesting read and I would recommend it as a good introduction to the Jewish question for anyone seeking to understand why our modern world looks the way it does. Mr. Kimathi deserves considerable praise, not only for what he has written, but also for what he chose to name his book. He could've easily called his book "Zionists Are The Problem,' or 'Secularizing Activists Are The Problem,' or 'Talmudic Sages Are The Problem,' or any number of less inflammatory, yet imprecise, titles that would have no doubt been more palatable to the average man on the street. Instead, he chose to speak frankly, exhibiting "great boldness of speech." (2 Cor 3:12)

On the back cover of his book, Mr. Kimathi writes the following: 

Are we ready to accept the reality that the Jewish desire to control the planet and exterminate the majority of its people, Black, White, Yellow, and Brown is real? Are we ready to accept the reality that their plan for global conquest is close to complete? Do we actually believe there is no common link between global food shortages, COVID-19, pedophilia in the schools, transgender normalization, skyrocketing fuel prices, the collapse of the dollar, and organized child-sex and organ trafficking? This book provides the link. JEWS ARE THE PROBLEM

I understand why people recoil upon hearing the word 'Jew' when it's used in a negative context. After a lifetime of conditioning, many people in the West have become accustomed to believing that any criticism of Jews will inevitably lead to some kind of a holocaust. On top of that, I'm sure almost every American probably knows somebody who was born into a Jewish family and is an upstanding citizen (even Hitler made Emil Maurice an honorary Aryan in 1935). The faces of the nice Jewish family down the street are undoubtedly among the first images that enter the minds of the Sally Soccer Moms and Joe Six-Packs anytime harsh words are spoken about Jews. But if we can't speak plainly and deal with the issue as it actually exists, not as we'd like it to exist, we have no hope of providing a coherent explanation for the fundamental threat facing our world today. The stakes are high and the time for clever euphemisms and mealy-mouthed evasions is over. It's high time we identify more than just war-Zionism and Bibi Netanyahu as obstacles to world peace. If both somehow disappeared tomorrow, the rotten fruit of the diseased tree of Judaism would continue to poison the world. Ayo Kimathi is right: Jews are the Problem.