Posted on 12/04/2014 6:36:46 PM PST by Coleus
Orthodox rabbis have distanced themselves from a Teaneck rabbi who wrote in an online blog post that Israel should permanently prohibit the creation of a Palestinian state, destroy the headquarters of the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah and jail Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas as a war criminal.
Writing in his blog last Friday, Rabbi Steven Pruzansky also called for Israel to deport relatives of terrorists, “up to and including first cousins,” and destroy their homes, and if a second terrorist is found in a village to destroy that village and deport all its residents.
Pruzansky, who leads the Bnai Yeshurun congregation, which claims to be the largest synagogue in Teaneck, said his remarks were based on “a single premise: that there is a war for the land of Israel that is being waged, and the Arabs who dwell in the land of Israel are the enemy in that war and must be vanquished.”
Prusansky’s remarks prompted expressions of dismay from other Orthodox Jewish clergymen, who said they were reluctant to criticize another rabbi but nonetheless distanced themselves from his language. Rabbi Shmuel Goldin of Englewood said he could understand Pruzansky’s frustration, but disagreed with his conclusions.
“Rabbi Pruzansky’s statements reflect the frustration that he feels and that many of us feel as we view the unfolding events in the Middle East,” Golden said. “However, his conclusions and recommendations certainly do not represent my view nor the view of many others in the Orthodox Jewish community.”
Rabbi Lawrence Zierler of Teaneck said: “I would distance myself from this language. The rabbis have developed a very different approach. People at the margins add insult to injury when they use intemperate language. It pains me that people would take so readily and quickly to the blogosphere, and it is unfortunate that people would write in such a manner.”
People of Palestinian origin in North Jersey were more outspoken in their criticism of Pruzansky. “Our state’s mainstream Jewish leadership should speak out strongly against extremists in their midst, just as American Muslim leaders have spoken out against religious extremism,” said Mohamed El Filali, executive director of the New Jersey chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
Salaheddin Mustafa of Clifton said he was outraged but not surprised, adding that Pruzansky was “echoing the statements that are coming from senior members of the Israeli government right now.” Pruzansky’s essay was disclosed by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in a report printed in The Times of Israel.
The blog post, titled “Dealing With Savages,” has since been removed, but it remained available in an Internet cache of deleted items until Monday afternoon, when it disappeared from that. However, before it became inaccessible, The Record made a copy of the full text of the blog post. Contacted at his home on Sunday night, Pruzansky said the JTA report was not accurate. “They distorted it, just like they do everything else,” he said. Pruzansky said he was responsible for deleting his own blog post. Asked why he had done so, he replied: “Two words: unspecified threats.”
“Everything I wrote was entirely reasonable, but they didn’t report that,” he said of the JTA report. “I wrote that Arabs who are peaceful should be allowed to live side by side with Israelis.” A close reading shows that Pruzansky stated near the end of the deleted 1,900-word blog entry: “Of course, those who wish to stay and be peaceful, acknowledging the sovereignty of the Jewish people in the land of Israel, are welcome to stay.”
Prior to that mitigating language, Pruzansky wrote: “Israel should make clear that a Palestinian state will never be created between the river and the sea. There will be no non-Jewish national entity tolerated. The Muqata in Ramallah should be destroyed and ‘President’ Abbas should be incarcerated as a war criminal.
“Terrorists will be killed, not captured,” he continued. “Their bodies will not be returned to their families but will be cremated, and perhaps the ashes buried with deceased pigs. The homes of the extended family (up to and including first cousins) of the terrorist will be destroyed, and they will all be deported to the Muslim country of their choice.
“A second terrorist in a village results in the destruction of that village and the deportation of its residents to a friendlier country. (If the homes in that village would be useful to Jews, then they should be retained and given to Jews after the evil residents are deported.”
He went on to say: “Anyone who riots or throws a stone at a Jew should be shot — with real bullets. Rubber bullets and tear gas should be sold to the Amish. Those who wish to be martyred and who celebrate death should be accommodated as often as possible.”
Pruzansky called for prohibiting news coverage. “The media should be barred from scenes of violence, cell service canceled and cameras confiscated, like in most war zones,” he said. Arabs, he said, “must be made to feel that that they have no future in the land of Israel — no national future and no individual future.”
It was not the first time that Pruzansky’s rhetoric caused consternation among fellow rabbis. Recently, for example, he compared the publication Jewish Week to a German Nazi propaganda newspaper during World War II, prompting criticism by the Orthodox Rabbinical Council of America, of which he is a member of the executive committee. Staff Writers Hannan Adely and Deena Yellin contributed to this article.
The rabbi needs some remdial studies in Torah.
Such retribution was even restrained by the goya Hammurabi.
I agree with his conclusions.
One destroys what is evil, one does not prostrate oneself in front of murderers armed with hatchets and meat cleavers.
Those rabbis who distance themselves from R. Pruzansky have already forgotten the blessed martyrs cut down brutally at Har Nof.
The murderers shall not inherit, they shall not receive a reward for their crimes. Those who hate Jews must never be blessed by them.
And any one who finds the truth offensive commits Chillul Hashem. One is forbidden before Heaven from averting one’s eyes from those whose hands are full of blood. Away with them!
Looks like Rabbi Pruzansky has a good defense plan to me. The so-called Palestinians (name given to them by the Romans) are an extreme foreign national security risk.
Problem is, the PA is essentially Hamas these days—very dangerous to all. They’re loose cannons, even in the eyes of several neighboring nations that don’t agree with Israel on everything.
...who wrote in an online blog post that Israel should permanently prohibit the creation of a Palestinian state, destroy the headquarters of the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah and jail Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas as a war criminal... also called for Israel to deport relatives of terrorists, “up to and including first cousins,” and destroy their homes, and if a second terrorist is found in a village to destroy that village and deport all its residents... based on “a single premise: that there is a war for the land of Israel that is being waged, and the Arabs who dwell in the land of Israel are the enemy in that war and must be vanquished.”Israel should set up covert programs to support PLO terrorism in other Middle Eastern countries, while simultaneously snuffing the terrorist leadership in Arab-occupied Gaza, Samaria, and Judah.
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