Thursday, March 28, 2024 -
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Bizarre

We had to blink twice. At first we thought we were seeing one of those over-the-top metaphors. But we weren’t. One Murray Koppelman, whom the JTA dubs a “well known philanthropist in New York,” actually went to Iran and, on that basis, decided he needed to give a half million dollars to the New Israel Fund. Why? Because Iran — Israel — well, it’s all the same.

We don’t begrudge the NIF its donation, but, as the ADL’s Abe Foxman said, while Koppelman is a “caring, loving, decent Zionist,” his comparison of Iran to Israel is “odious.” Koppelman saw the way women were treated in Iran, decided that this is Israel’s destiny, and wants to head it off by funding NIF. 

NIF Fund, naturally, took the money and said thank you. But the idea that voluntary, separate seating on a few private Israeli buses is soon to become what Koppelman saw in Iran — women, all dressed in chadors, pushed to the back of public buses — is bizarre. Mr. Koppelman: Our main problem with Iran right now is nuclear.

Copyright © 2012 by the Intermountain Jewish News




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