RABBI LERNER'S HOME VANDALIZED

Rabbi Michael Lerner's home in Berkeley was vandalized over the weekend. According to a press release issued by Tikkun Magazine, "The attackers used a powerful form of glue to attach posters to his door and around the property of his home attacking Lerner personally, and attacking liberals and progressives as being supporters of terrorism and "Islamo-fascism."
They posted a printed bumper sticker saying "fight terror--support Israel" next to a caricature of Judge Goldstone whose UN report on Israel's human rights violations in its attack on Gaza last year has been denounced as anti-Semitic and pro-terror by right wingers in Israel and the U.S.. The caricature has Goldstone talking about being kept from his grandson's bar mitzvah, and the caricature of Rabbi Lerner responds by saying "any enemy of Israel is a friend of mine."

------------------------------------

VANDALISM IS AN ACT OF HATE

Okay then, can you spell S.T.U.P.I.D. out there in Alwaysrightistan?

Do you really think such acts of vandalism are justified? What the hell is wrong with you? Where is your sense of Jewish Ethics? Where is your common decency?
And do you REALLY think that such stupid and reprehensible actions will not come back to haunt you?


Look, I don't agree with Rabbi Michael Lerner either.
But he's free to have his own point of view, and, like everyone in this country, he is free to be wrong, utterly and completely wrong.
Disagreement is one thing, targeted vandalism is something else entirely.
It's positively European.

------------------------------------

Press Release: From Tikkun Magazine
Contact: Will Pasley 510 644 1200
Rabbi Lerner's Home Attacked by ... [CUT: unwarranted assumption]

Berkeley, Ca. May 3, 2010
Release date: May 4, 2010

Berkeley police today confirmed that the attack on Rabbi Lerner's home late Sunday June 2nd or early morning Sunday July 3rd was in fact a crime and was being investigated.
The attackers used a powerful form of glue to attach posters to his door and around the property of his home attacking Lerner personally, and attacking liberals and progressives as being supporters of terrorism and "Islamo-fascism."
They posted a printed bumper sticker saying "fight terror--support Israel" next to a carcature (stet) of Judge Goldstone whose UN report on Israel's human rights violations in its attack on Gaza last year has been denounced as anti-Semitic and pro-terror by right wingers in Israel and the U.S..

... [CUT : self-serving blather] ...

In the 24 years of Tikkun's operation, we have received many death threats and vicious hate mail, including phone calls to our office announcing that "Rabbi Lerner is dead" and others saying "We will kill all of you."

This particular attack has two worrisome elements not previously there:

1. They attack Rabbi Lerner's home.
As law enforcement people told us, this is a way of conveying the messaget to Lerner: "We know where you live, we know your house is vulnerable, so don't ignore our threats."

2. By linking Lerner to alleged terrorism, they provide for themselves and other extremists a "right-wing justification"to use violence against Lerner, even though
Lerner has been a prominent advocate of non-violence.

He regularly critiques Palestinian acts of violence when they occur, including the shelling of Israeli towns by Hamas, just as he critiques the violence of the Israeli occupation, and as he critiques the US war in Iraq and Afghanistan, the occupation of Chechny by Russia, the occupation of Tibet by China, the human rights violations agaisnt their own people by the rulers of Iran, the acts of violence of those resisting the US occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan, the violence against women and homosexuals in many Arab and African countries (and in
the US and Israel as well), the genocide in Darfur, the violence against Jews in some parts of Europe, and the list goes on.

Needless to say, this latest attack, on Lerner's home, has caused great concern to his family.

... [CUT: one-sided statement] ...