Majorityrights News > Category: European Nationalism

What is behind Netanyahu’s “gesture” presented last Wednesday to German Chancellor Merkel?

In an ostensible gesture, Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, proposed to relieve Nazi Germany ergo present day Germany of complete guilt for the holocaust.

Netanyahu suggested that at the point when Hitler met with the Palestinian Mufti in November 1941, that he did not intend to exterminate the Jews but had a sincere plan to merely expel them to Palestine.

Netanyahu continued, that when the Mufti refused to agree, Hitler asked what then should be done with the Jews? The Mufti responded, “burn them.” Netanyahu then claimed with that, that “the Mufti was one of the initiators of the systematic extermination of European Jewry and a partner and adviser to Eichmann and Hitler for the execution of this plan.”

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Most people would be satisfied with putting Netanyahu’s rendition aside for the obvious absurdities that arise to its credibility from the outset. Why would Hitler seriously expect the Palestinians to agree to allow Jews, or any non-Palestinians (but especially Jews), to immigrate to his country? That is, how could it have been a serious proposal by Hitler? The answer is that it could not have been, and it wasn’t. It was a bluff, a typical ploy of Hitler’s: “well, we tried.”

To a lesser extent it was also an occasion to discuss with the Palestinians how they might cooperate with Nazi Germany. However, the idea that Hitler seriously sought council from the Mufti and followed his lead in regard to how to deal with Jews is risible.

There is all kinds of evidence that Nazi Germany, in accordance with Hitler’s designs, had already commenced with killing Jews as a solution the Jewish problem as they saw it; and had no problem with killing, exterminating Jews; there is even evidence of an emergent plan that regarding the Jews that he did allow to escape to Palestine, that they were facilitated in going there upon the agreement with Muslims that they would be taken care of there, in subsequent cooperation between Nazi Germany and Muslims to make sure that they could never become ensconced in the area.

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No serious ethno-nationalist is accepting Netanyahu’s dealing of the card of Hitler’s absolution at anywhere near face value.

There are a few relevant exceptions, and it is for their compliant reaction to divide and conquer that Netanyahu plays this card.

1. The philo-semitic counter-jihadists who might be looking to see Israeli actions against Palestinians as more valid than previously understood. They are already in the tank for Israel and Jews, as completely innocent victims and scapegoats. They seek to gain Israel and whatever part of liberal Europe that they can against Islam alone, in perhaps a desperate hope by their non-Jewish component, that Israel will care enough to sincerely help. That is a joke and the plainest level of divide and conquer, which the Gates of Vienna and the Geert Wilders ilk has already bought into.

2. Some foolish Naziphile’s who are unfortunately associated with White Nationalism will take the bait in seeking to absolve Hitler from any responsibility for the holocaust; what is more bizarre is that some of these types tend to hope that Russia will be the great White hope of WN. The Russian/Jewish coalition will exploit this delusional hope that it might cooperate with White Nationalism, while doing all it can to prohibit racial nationalism; let alone allowing for the embrace of those who would resurrect Hitler, the arch enemy of its “Great War” - a war which its entire nation knows expended 25 million and which, to this day, would view such resurgence of German Nazism as its greatest threat, were it not so overly prepared for that contingency: hence, why it probably is that they allow Netanyahu some freeplay with that card - in order to keep Russian and Eastern European people under threat.

3. Merkel and liberals of her ilk whose career, power and license have underpinnings in German guilt are the third category who might respond at face value to Netanyahu’s ploy. Hence, her characteristic response being the opposite - that “no, no, Germany was fully responsible for the holocaust.”  

Getting these three groups to react in an overcompensating manner will invoke responses from other national players that can put Netanyahu’s divide strategy into fuller effect.The overcompensating response invoked in these groups would tend to highlight and align some of the normal German ethno-nationalist positions with a more Naziphilic position, which will undermine and destabilize Merkel’s base by forcing her to distance herself further into her overcompensatingly liberal position in order to maintain her liberal support base. That will then cause few more of the normal ethno-nationalists to display, in frustration, a more forthrightly Nazistic position - nowadays a weak position, as it is limited of itself; divisive not only against German liberals; but normal German ethno-nationalists, who are the authentic opposition to both Merkel and Netanyahu.

                          
While Merkel looks like a deer caught in the headlights, Netanyahu does not look the least bit concerned, does he? He looks upon Merkel with dismissive contempt, as if to say, “do you seriously think you can do anything about it, piss-ant?”

Netanyahu knew that Merkel would never respond in an ethnonationalist way, in anything but an obsequious, liberal way.

Merkel has already obliged by missing what would be an opportunity for a normal ethno-nationalists to say, “thank you for at least conceding that Germany, especially present day Germany, is not fully responsible for what happened in WW2 and was not, even then, some sort of ex-nihilo source of evil, but had an existential conflict with Jews; that was confirmed by the fact that other peoples had highly analogous difficulties with Jews, which even Nazi Germany was willing to discuss and negotiate to some extent. Not only is it clear that Nazi Germany viewed Jewry as a mortal enemy for plain reasons; it is time for Israel and Jewry to stop pretending to be the sheerly innocent victims and light of the world; the time has long since past when subsequent generations of Germans, let alone the rest of Europe as well, should be subject to the blackmail, extortion and bribes of Israel for a war that took the form of a will to kill those who were seen as the enemy, a mortal threat of a people; in the same kind of war that had been conducted by Israel/Jews themselves, so many times, ranging from those chronicled in the Old Testament - e.g., in The Book of Esther that you quoted before U.S. Congress - to the genocidal crimes of Soviet Jewry just prior to World War II - mass exterminations by Jews which Hitler saw as part and parcel of the existential threat he sought to protect Germans from.”

Netanyahu knows her and he knows she won’t say that. She would be taken out of power in the moment she spoke that way. While there may be an aspect of restraint in Merkel’s response, in that she cares that Germans not overcompensate to theirs and other Europeans’ detriment (including for the fact that Jews might just do some nasty things against the German people if she were too flagrant), given that she, herself, has already colluded by setting the worst in motion, that mitigation of potential recrimination is clearly a subservient motivation - she is obviously not overly concerned with the E.G.I. of Germans and other Europeans.

Her concern must be some combination of maintaining her power and some ideals which she holds to be more important than German and other European people. For her ideals, Netanyahu views her with the contempt of a pissant. By pushing her into an ever more compromised liberal position he furthers his interest directly by the dissolution of the German people and any threat of their organized response to what is being done to them by Israel and by Jews more broadly.

By highlighting neo-Nazi efforts to legitimize Hitler, he puts both her and German ethnonationalism in a weak position - forcing her to retrench in her liberal position domestically, less able to compromise against infighting with emergent nationalism, especially displays of ‘Nazism”; while there is only so-far that Hitler advocacy can go abroad. If it does gain any momentum, it will lead into conflict with other European nations - especially Eastern European - and fully act-into the divide and conquer scenario which will already be taking form psychologically as a part of Eastern European and Russian reaction.

Still, Netanyahu does not view Putin with quite the same level of disregard. And it is not likely that Putin and Russia, at this point, are going to be highly threatened by the prospects of Nazi Germany soon re-emerging. Nevertheless, Russia’s people can be provoked and kept at bay, just as Jews are provoked by their own and kept at bay through fear of resurgent Nazism… It will be used to strengthen propaganda to alienate their people from European ethno-nationalists and from supporting their aims: These people are “Nazis”, “fascists”, “racists” and “already 25 million were lost in order to defeat them in ‘The Great War’ - we can never trust them….we must support their liberalization instead.”

As Eastern European nations, Belarus, Ukraine, Poland and more, are inclined to look incredulously upon that Russian “innocence” and resist being subsumed into Russia’s sphere of interest, Russia will be more inclined to allow those who go the way of Europe to be divided, fragmented against others, weakened to powerlessness by the immigration invasion. Russia will cynically allow for divide and conquer and they will try to expand their interests .. in all likelihood, developing closer ties with Israel and Jewish diaspora. That will put a significant damper on hopes of those in German, European and other White ethnonationalists who wish to treat Russia as the great White hope.

Yes, Netanyahu is hoping to divide Europe from Russia. But does the Russian leadership care? Probably not much. They probably have an understanding with Netanhayu. And the real divide and conquer is likely to be in regard to Eastern Europe: still predominantly White and with ethno-nationalistic motivation - with enough experience of Jews to be anti-Semitic, enough experience of Russian/Jewish imperialism to be resistant to its aggrandizement, and, of course, potentially provoked by the resurrections of Hitler so as not to be able to fully cooperate with those who would lord Hitler as the paragon of virtue - hence, Netanyahu’s reason to resurrect Hitler’s legitimacy, to get people talking in the provocative way of Hitler apologists so as to antagonize any cooperation with Russia, but even more-so, any cooperation with Eastern Europe.

In this way, Netanhayhu can attempt to broker a situation where the Jewish/Russian East and the Jewish/corporate West can divide-up Eastern Europe and put at bay the remaining, homogeneous White ethno-national nations and their cooperation to European resistance. Fortunately, it is not necessary for Eastern European ethno-nationalists to act-into Netanyahu’s divide and conquer.

The realistic potential for ethno-nationalist coalitions and regional coalitions are emerging to where the would-be Jewish/Russian brokers will be looked upon not as protectors against Nazism, not even as middle men, not even marginalized in their opinions, but those who will be subject to our will.

The people who are still somehow running the German government with no trouble at all, would probably like to thank the German people for having been ‘so understanding and kind’ as to have accepted a mere 300,000 migrants from the Middle East and North Africa. They mean actually 600,000. No, wait, they mean 800,000. No, hold on, 920,000. Oh, not quite, more like 1.5 million. No, just kidding, they’d like to thank the German people for accepting 7.36 million migrants.

Seriously:

The Australian, ‘Angela Merkel hit by leaked forecast of 1.5 million migrants’, 07 Oct 2015 (emphasis added):

Chancellor Angela Mer­kel is facing open dissent from members of her coalition government amid predictions that the number of migrants arriving in Germany this year could reach 1.5 million.

The figure — almost double the official forecasts — added to the impression Ms Merkel had lost control of the issue amid polls showing her popularity ratings, which had defied gravity for so long, were beginning to plummet.

Ms Merkel has refused to talk about limits to the number of refugees Germany can accommodate but Sigmar Gabriel, her deputy and the leader of the Social Democratic party, has declared that the time has come to reduce arrivals.

The new estimate of 1.5 million came in a confidential government paper leaked to the newspaper Bild. It is widely believed the source of the leak was the interior ministry.

The secret document said each refugee had a “family factor” of four to eight people, meaning they could be expected to arrange for up to eight relatives to join them once settled in Germany, as they were entitled to do if granted refugee status. As Bild pointed out, this could mean that 7.36 million eventually arrived as a result of this year’s influx. Germany’s population is now 80 million.

“We believe that in the fourth quarter of the year there will be between 7000 and 10,000 illegal border crossings every day,” the document stated.

“These high figures for asylum-seekers threaten to put extreme pressure on the (German) states and communities.”

The document put a figure on potential arrivals from October to December of 920,000, Bild said. In contrast to some expert views, it did not foresee a reduction during the winter months despite the harsher weather and more difficult travelling conditions.

Fewer asylum-seekers were expected from the Balkan states after Germany’s information campaign to deter people from that region but an increase was foreseen from conflict zones, especially Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere called last week for annual limits on refugees and proposed that any arrivals above the quota should be sent to somewhere safe in their region.

He added these were his personal views and not those of the government.

He is seen as one of Ms Merkel’s closest advisers and she later praised his work while refusing to place a limit on migrant numbers. Now she also faces open dissent from Mr Gabriel.

“We must urgently achieve a clear reduction in the number of refugees in the coming year in Germany,” the deputy chancellor told Suddeutsche Zeitung.

He added: “We must also think about the cohesion of German ­society.”

Ms Merkel’s stance towards asylum-seekers is said to have made her a contender for this year’s Nobel peace prize, which will be announced on Friday, but it has also led to the shine coming off her popular support.

A poll last week showed that her personal support rating had fallen to 54 per cent, down nine points in a month.

Thousands took to the streets of the eastern city of Dresden yesterday, accusing Ms Merkel of “crimes against the German ­people” and “treason”.

“It won’t stop with 1.5 or two million,” said Lutz Bachmann, the co-founder of the anti-Islam ­PEGIDA movement, which organised the march. “They will have their wives come, and one, two, three children. It is an impossible task to integrate these people.”

Meanwhile, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan urged the EU to consider a no-fly zone and safe haven area in Syria during talks to address Europe’s migrant crisis.

Speaking after discussions in Brussels, Mr Erdogan said Turkey was bearing the brunt of the crisis and pressed the bloc to act against “state-sponsored terrorism” in Syria as President Bashar al-Assad’s regime battles rebels and militants.

The EU said Turkey must do more to stop the flow of refugees who have landed on its shores. “It is indisputable that Europe has to manage its borders better. We expect Turkey to do the same,” the EU president, Donald Tusk, said.

The “root cause” of the refugee crisis was the “state-sponsored terrorism actually carried out by Assad himself,” Mr Erdogan said, saying three things needed to be done to end the crisis.

“One is to focus on training and equipment, the second is to declare a safe zone that would be protected from terrorism and the third is a no-fly zone,” Mr Erdogan said.

Western officials had previously cast doubt on the Turkish proposals for a no-fly “safe zone” in northern Syria where refugees could take shelter from the bloody conflict.

Brussels and Ankara also reportedly discussed a European Commission plan that would see Turkey join Greek coastguard pat­rols in the eastern Aegean, co-­ordinated by EU border agency Frontex. Any migrants picked up would be taken back to Turkey where six new camps for up to two million people would be built, co-financed by the EU.

The Times, AFP

But actually, are they ready for the next iteration, which is 9.6 million if the upper bound estimate for this year is hit? Or perhaps next year, when the number might push toward 18 million potentially showing up? Because no one has been talking about next year yet.

With numbers like this, it really could become possible that 20% of Germany’s population will be Middle Eastern and North African, which is an incredibly rapid change.

#ProjectGermany is not a nation-state. It’s an idea, it’s a proposition nation based on the idea of unlimited Christian charity, and absolutely stupid amounts of naive liberalism. Also, lots of guilt.

#ProjectGermany is not a place where Germans live, it’s an idea.

Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven has launched a new assault on native Swedes in the form of a project called “Sweden together.”
                       
         
Prime Minister Stefan Löfven with Culture Minister Alice Bah Kuhnke. Photo: TT
                         
The Prime Minister began its latest manifestation, an October 12 conference, where the royal couple was sitting in the audience. Sponsored by “Swedish” newspaper “judisk krönika” (Jewish Chronicle), the conference featured Jewish studies lecturer, Ingrid Lomfors.

Ms. Lomfors informed the audience that in effect that they do not exist as an entity…
   

..there exists no Swedish culture, we are all immigrants and that therefore we must accept immigration - that is our duty.

Some background on “Sweden Together”

The Local, “Stefan Löfven has called for Sweden’s entire public sector to unite to ensure the swift resettlement of the latest influx of refugees”, Sept. 10, 2015:

The Social Democrat Prime Minister announced an initiative called ‘Sweden Together’ (‘Sverige tillsammans’) on Thursday morning.

He said that municipalities, religious groups, sports associations, unions and public sector employers would all be invited to a major conference in October to discuss how to help refugees better integrate into Swedish communities.

The Prime Minister told Swedish public broadcaster Sveriges Radio that he wanted a more even distribution of refugees across all 290 municipalities in Sweden, a policy that has been pushed by Sweden’s integration minister Ylva Johansson in recent months.

At a press conference in Stockholm at midday, ahead of cross-party talks on the refugee crisis, Löfven said there would be a large focus on getting refugees into schooling and the work force.

“This is about them having a speedy entrance into our society and getting a job, education, and housing,” Löfven told reporters.

“For us to be able to get through this demographic challenge, we need to get more working. This means we need to quickly get those who have newly arrived into the work force. This is what our investments are aiming for.”

One concrete change that was announced at the press conference was an increase in the compensation for municipalities per refugee, which will be raised from 83,100 kronor ($9,867) to 125,000 kronor ($14,873).

The government said it would earmark 1.8 billion kronor for the entire package to be spent over the next year. 870 million kronor of this will go into helping refugees find work quicker, offering speedier translation and validation of foreign education

The leaders of Sweden’s centre-right Alliance parties which made up former Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt’s previous government are set to attend discussions with Löfven later in the day, along with the leaders of the government’s coalition partners the Greens and the Left Party. The nationalist anti-immigration Sweden Democrat party has not been invited.

“We must have a political gathering, both about what we’re doing here at home in Sweden, but also what Sweden stands for in the EU,” said Löfven, adding that it was currently “unhelpful” that Sweden and Germany were currently sharing the bulk of responsibility for new arrivals.

Sweden’s Prime Minister met Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin earlier this week. Both leaders told a press conference that they backed the introduction of new quotas to force other European countries to take in more refugees, as is being proposed by the European Commission.

The Nordic nation currently takes in more refugees per capita than any other EU member state.

Sweden’s Migration Board (Migrationsverket) received a total of 11,743 applications for asylum last month, up from 6,619 in June and 8,066 in July, as an increasing number of refugees headed for Scandinavia over the summer.

FLASHBACK: THINGS VLADIMIR PUTIN ACTUALLY SAID II

The series is, as I promised yesterday, ongoing. This is the second instalment of flashbacks as to how much Vladimir Putin and Russians in general despise all ethno-nationalists and ethno-regionalists and would dearly love to shut all of us down.

Here’s one from last year that everyone forgot about, which involved the use of the infrastructure of the United Nations. This was the time when Russia tried to trick the world into promising to outlaw all forms of all advocacy of ethnic self-defence:

And here’s the relevant excerpt:

Russia is the only country to date that has had the gall to attempt something like that, and to have chosen the timing that they chose. Given the mass migration problem that Europe is presently facing, it makes that little episode truly significant.

Basically, if there is a person who believes that Russia is not a mortal enemy on these issues, then I have a bridge to sell such a person, and it’s on the moon.

You can read the full PDF of the draft here:

Download PDF SHA-1 Checksum

Vladimir Putin with Berel Lazar.

FLASHBACK

This should be considered the first edition of a series that will more properly be known as ‘Things Vladimir Putin actually said’.

There are some instances where you only have to ask at the source to find out what the reality is:

The Jerusalem Post, ‘In letter, Putin wishes Jews of Russia ‘a sweet and happy new year’‘, 13 Sep 2015 (emphasis added):

In a special letter sent to Russia’s Chief Rabbi Sunday, Russian President Vladimir Putin wished the Jewish community throughout the country a “sweet and happy new year” on the eve of Rosh Hashana, according to Russian State media.

The note, addressed to the office of Russian Chief Rabbi Berel Lazar, also connoted Putin’s admiration for the Russian Jewish community’s strength and unity, saying “For centuries, Jewish values inspire lofty ideals” while bridging together “relations among different peoples…through charity (and) education, all in the interest of the public good.”

Putin went on to say that the scourge of hatred and intolerance towards the Jewish community must be combated in Russia, with “fierce opposition to any manifestation of anti-Semitism and xenophobia.”

Putin ended the letter by writing that he wishes the Jews of Russia “good health, happiness and wealth,” in the new year to come.

Ostensibly, Putin’s relationship with the Jewish community in Russia has been amicable, with leaders in the past praising his outreach. In April, Alexander Boroda, head of the Chabad-affiliated Federation of Jewish Communities of Russia, went so far as to say that the survival of Russian Jewry was dependent on Putin staying in power.

“The Jews of Russia must realize the dangers inherent in the possible collapse of the Putin government, understand the rules of the game and be aware of the limitations,” Boroda said during a talk at Moscow’s 9th annual Jewish learning event organized by Limmud FSU.

Also, this:

The Jerusalem Post, ‘Senior Russian rabbi: Putin ouster would endanger Jews’, 26 Apr 2014 (emphasis added):

MOSCOW— A senior Russian rabbi warned of grave danger to Jews if Russian President Vladimir Putin is swept from power.

Alexander Boroda, head of the Chabad-affiliated Federation of Jewish Communities of Russia, made the warning Friday during a talk at Moscow’s 9th annual Jewish learning event organized by Limmud FSU.

“The Jews of Russia must realize the dangers inherent in the possible collapse of the Putin government, understand the rules of the game and be aware of the limitations,” Boroda said at a sessions, according to a translation provided by Limmud FSU.

The Moscow conference, which drew 1,400 participants, opened Friday at the state-owned Klyasma resort just outside the Russian capital.

Boroda’s Federation is among several Russian Jewish organizations that credit Putin for facilitating efforts to re-consolidate Russia’s Jewish community of 350,000 after decades of communist repression.

Under Putin, dozens of synagogues have been renovated with government support and a massive Jewish museum was opened in Moscow with state funding.

“In Russia, there is virtually unlimited freedom of religion and the Jewish community must ensure this situation continues,” Boroda said. “The support for religious institutions is wider than in the United States and defense of Jews against manifestations of anti-Semitism is greater than in other European countries. We do not have the privilege of losing what we have achieved and the support of the government for the community.”

All Russian Jews and especially those considering action against the Putin administration, Boroda said, “must understand the grave dangers that they take upon themselves and the potential consequences.”

Such endorsements of Putin by Jewish leaders have exposed them to criticism by liberal Jews and Jews in Ukraine, who oppose Putin’s crackdown on civil liberties and rivals, annexation of Ukrainian land and perceived nationalism.

Viktoria Mochilova, a Limmud FSU participant and social activist, dismissed Boroda’s message as one-sided and unrepresentative. While appreciative of government support for Jews, they, “similar to other Russian citizens, [desire] to improve the situation of the state and to strive to make it more democratic and honest,” she said.

Just in case any of you are wondering who Rabbi Berel Lazar is in relation to Vladimir Putin, that he should be the one to receive such a warm note of appreciation from him, read this:

Forward.com, ‘Why Russian Chief Rabbi Stands by Vladimir Putin’, 05 Jun 2015 (emphasis added):

Rabbi Berel Lazar’s mother was eager for grandchildren. So she gave her 25-year-old son an ultimatum: He could return to his beloved Jewish outreach work in Russia if — and only if — he got married.

His yeshiva classmates jokingly said he was already wed, “to the idea of going to Russia,” said Lazar, the son of Chabad-Lubavitch emissaries in Milan, Italy.

A few months after his mother put her foot down in 1989, Lazar wed his American-born wife, Channa, and the couple settled in Moscow, where they raised 14 children.

An emissary for Chabad, Lazar, 51, would go on to become one of Russia’s two chief rabbis, a major and controversial force in the dramatic revival of Russian Jewry following decades of Communist oppression and mass immigration to Israel, the United States, Germany and elsewhere.

Lazar’s work, his Russia boosterism and his ties to the Kremlin — he is sometimes called “Putin’s rabbi” — has helped Chabad’s Russian branch eclipse all the Jewish groups vying to reshape the country’s community of 250,000 Jews. Now Lazar heads a vast network that comprises dozens of employees and plentiful volunteers working in hundreds of Jewish institutions: schools, synagogues, community centers and kosher shops.

“I am amazed at what became of a community that had been stripped of everything, even its books,” Lazar said, referring to Soviet Jewry before the fall of communism, when religious practice was suppressed.

Today, Lazar said, Russia has in Vladimir Putin its “most pro-Jewish leader,” whom he credits with “fighting anti-Semitism more vigorously than any Russian leader before him.”

But criticism of Lazar’s partnership with Putin persists as the Russian president makes use of his pro-Jewish credentials in justifying his policies. The strongman has repeatedly cited the alleged anti-Semitism of Ukrainian nationalists in justifying Russia’s 2014 annexation of the Ukraine-controlled Crimea. In January, Putin inveighed against Ukrainian nationalists — he called them “Banderites,” a reference to the Ukrainian Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera — during a speech he delivered on International Holocaust Memorial Day, when he was Lazar’s guest at Moscow’s Jewish museum. Lazar has also been criticized for his presence at Kremlin events, like the one last year celebrating Russia’s Crimea annexation. (“Like other clerics, my duties include officiating at state events,” Lazar said in an interview with JTA.)

To Roman Bronfman, a former Israeli lawmaker and author of a book about Russian-Jewish immigration to Israel, the relationship between Putin and Lazar is a “beneficiary symbiosis.” Lazar’s support for Putin, Bronfman said, “is a constant and the basis of his claim to the title of chief rabbi.”

Lazar was Chabad’s chief envoy to Russia before staking claim to the title of chief rabbi in 2000. That’s when he quit the Russian Jewish Congress, an umbrella group, after the organization’s founder, Vladimir Gusinsky, and Russia’s other chief rabbi, Adolf Shayevich, criticized Russia’s war in Chechnya and its alleged human rights abuses — including the alleged targeting, by anti-corruption authorities, of political dissidents.

“Challenging the government is not the Jewish way, and [Gusinsky] put the Jewish community in harm’s way,” said Lazar, noting that the chief rabbi should be apolitical, not a government critic. “I wanted to have nothing to do with this.”

Shayevich, who has been chief rabbi since 1993, heads the Keroor religious congress, a body responsible for religious services at affiliated synagogues. In March, Keroor and Lazar’s Federation of Jewish Communities of the CIS, or FJC — both are Orthodox bodies — signed a nonaggression pact in which the groups committed to not speak ill of one another in public. The agreement ended years of acrimonious exchanges in the media, but Keroor to this day does not recognize Lazar’s claim to his title of chief rabbi.

In recent years, however, Lazar’s federation eclipsed Keroor in prominence and reach. FJC operates in 160 cities, compared to Keroor’s 34. In addition, FJC has departments in other former Soviet countries, which means Lazar also has considerable clout in the Jewish communities of Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan, and elsewhere.

In 2012, Moscow opened a $50 million Jewish museum that is headed by Lazar’s top aide, Rabbi Boruch Gorin.

Putin’s support for the Jewish community, Lazar said, “flows from his respect for religion and warm sentiments” to Judaism, not out of political calculation. Russian Jews, Lazar added in reference to Putin’s time in office, “have a duty to use this golden hour and press ahead with community growth.” Still, Putin was quick to leverage the new Jewish museum for his needs.

In 2013, the space became Putin’s answer to an international legal dispute involving the Schneerson Library — composed of texts by Joseph I. Schneerson, a late leader of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement, which have been held by the Russian state since Communist authorities confiscated them in 1917. A U.S. federal judge in 2013 ruled in favor of Chabad lawyers in the United States who are seeking the return of the library to Brooklyn, where the Hasidic group is based.

Lazar reluctantly agreed to Putin’s request that the texts be housed in the museum as a form of compromise. The claimants in New York refuse to see it as such, but the move showed Putin’s influence over Lazar.

“He wanted to solve a problem,” Lazar said of Putin’s so-called compromise, “though it may have caused a problem for me.”

But Lazar and Putin’s relationship seems to go deeper than political expediency. In 2012, Lazar led the Russian leader on a tour of Jerusalem’s Western Wall. And last year Putin made Lazar a member of Russia’s prestigious Merit to the Fatherland order, the country’s highest civilian decoration and one that is rarely conferred on people who were not born in Russia. (Lazar became a Russian citizen in 2000.)

Lazar’s prominence has a powerful effect on his constituents. At a recent brit milah in Moscow, men from a Sephardic family from the Caucasus lined up to shake his hand at a shul that fell silent when Lazar stepped in. After the shake, they kissed their own palm as a show of their reverence for Lazar, whom some in attendance described as a great sage.

Many Russian-Jewish leaders are happy to bask in the warmth of such adoration. But to Lazar — who has armed guards, a chauffeur and several assistants — his congregants’ reverence is an unwanted byproduct of a title he neither coveted nor particularly enjoys, he said. If not for his current position, Lazar said, he would have preferred to be a teacher like his father in Milan.

Dovid Eliezrie, a Chabad rabbi who recently completed writing a book on the movement’s global outreach efforts, said Lazar for months resisted pressure by other Chabad leaders to accept the title of chief rabbi. Lazar acquiesced only after a former Israeli chief rabbi revealed that Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the revered Chabad leader who died in 1994, had said Lazar would be a good candidate for becoming Russia’s chief rabbi one day.

The title, as Lazar has come to see it, is nothing more than “a tool that allows me to achieve certain goals for my community.”

Would anyone among the pro-Kremlin and pro-Russian crowd out there, like to explain what on earth all of that is?

Vladimir Putin is the same kind of man who various white nationalist parties believe is someone under whose auspices European civilisation can find recourse from the hazardous liberal political environment in the North Atlantic. Is it possible for these parties and those who are inclined to share that belief in Russia and in Putin, to be any more cucked than that?

Seriously, Estonia, Luxembourg & Sweden are to be thronged within days, as invaders are directed northward from their Mediterranean beachheads:

(ANSA) - Brussels, October 2 - EU sources said Friday the relocation of asylum seekers from Italy to other EU nations including Estonia, Luxembourg and Sweden will begin “within days”. The idea is to get it done before the next EU summit on October 15, the sources said. EU interior ministers agreed in September to resettle 120,000 asylum seekers from Greece and Italy - where most refugees fleeing across the Mediterranean usually make first landfall - to other member States.

Of auguries, apparitions and specters..                                                                                                  .

With the help of the Swedish government, Barbara Spectre set-up a non-denominational institute of Jewish learning with the Greek name of Paideia -

She believes Jews have a key role to play in a country undergoing profound change:

“I think there is a resurgence of anti-Semitism because Europe has not yet learned how to be multicultural; and I think that we’re going to be part of the throes of that transformation, which much take place. Europe is not going to be the ‘monolithic’ ..uh, uh, societies they once were in the last century. Jews are going to be at the center of that - it’s a huge transformation for Europe to make. They are now going into a multi-cultural mode, and Jews will be resented because of our leading role.”

She adds….”but without that leading role and with out that transformation, Europe will not survive.” - ??

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Even where not required by EU quotas, Ireland’s Catholic bishops are calling for Irish parishes to accept and settle refugees who “will be arriving for months and years to come.”

Catholic bishops urge parishes to prepare to aid migrants:

Prelates seek reform of direct provision for asylum seekers to avoid two-tier system

The Catholic bishops have called on parishes throughout the island to mobilise resources to help with the resettlement of migrants who come to Ireland.

They have also called for urgent reform in direct provision for asylum seekers to avoid the emergence of an unjust two-tier system.

In a statement on Thursday afternoon, the bishops encouraged “all members of our parish communities to explore how they might offer their services, talents, time and commitment to supporting the resettlement of refugees through practical parish actions such as friendship and welcome schemes, English language classes, trauma counselling and medical services, as well as legal advice services”.

Demanding solidarity

They noted how “local communities across the island of Ireland have reacted to the worsening refugee crisis by mobilising to demand greater solidarity from European political leaders. The swift and enthusiastic response to Pope Francis’s appeal to parishes shows a ready willingness to help and a recognition that our parishes need to be places of welcome to all.

“Bishops are working with clergy and other diocesan personnel, as well as faith-based organisations, to assess our capacity to contribute to the national and international response.”

They said that “given the magnitude of the current crisis, refugees will be arriving for months and years to come, and it will be some years before they can safely return to their country of origin. Co-operation and clear sharing of responsibility across relevant Government departments, to address different types of need, is a necessary foundation for strategic planning.”

                                           
                      Their wisdom, its imperative action cast aside as a lesson to be re-learned…

Spain grants citizenship for 4,302 descendants of expelled Jews:

Move is aimed at atoning for the ‘historic mistake’ of forcing Sephardic Jews to leave on pain of death

October 2, 2015

Spain granted citizenship on Friday for 4,302 Sephardic Jews under a new law aimed at atoning for the expulsion of their Jewish ancestors five centuries ago in the Inquisition.

The law allowing dual citizenship for descendants of Jews who were forced to flee Spain in 1492 or face burning at the stake was approved by the Spanish parliament in June and came into force on Thursday.

But Justice Minister Rafael Catala said Friday the government had approved an extra measure to save paperwork for thousands who had already filed applications for nationality before the latest law came into force.

The new decree “has allowed us at one stroke to grant nationality to 4,302 people of Sephardic origin” whose applications under previous legislation were already pending, Catala told a news conference after a cabinet meeting.

“This is one more step in developing the law for granting nationality to the Sephardim,” he said in reference to the descendents of Spanish Jews forceed into exile.

“It seemed fair, rather than making them go through the process of filing their applications again, to speed up the process.”

The measure aims to correct what the Spanish government has called the “historic mistake” of the country’s Catholic monarchs sending Jews into exile in 1492.

Jewish groups welcomed the law in June, though some Jewish leaders complained the requirements are too burdensome.

Applicants do not have to be practising Jews but they must have their ancestry vetted by Jewish authorities and prove a “special connection” to and knowledge of Spain.

Historians believe at least 200,000 Jews lived in Spain before the monarchs Isabella and Ferdinand ordered them to convert to the Catholic faith or leave the country on pain of death.

Up to 3.5 million people around the world are thought to have Sephardic Jewish ancestry.